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Class JiSl 
ISdok .^SH 



PRESENTi:i) 13Y 




American Baik Note Co., N. Y. 



/iirymts /fcy/ILxA/f^x^ 



OCCASIONAL PAPERS 



FOR 



M. E. D. S. 



IN 



MDCCCLXXIX 



B Y 

HOMER H. STUART. 



NEW YORK : 

Styles & Cash, Printers, 77 Eighth Avenue. 

1880. 



V 



Z^ 






THE SOUL. 



" Animula, vagula, blandula, 
" Hospes, comesque, corporis — 
" Qu9e nunc abibis in loca ? 

Hadrian. 

Egypt was tlie land of symbols. Its speculations were 
tinged with mysticism, and took concrete forms in propositions 
having double meanings. A college of learned men monopo- 
lized knowledge, and recorded it in a secret alphabet. 

The strange figures found near their temples, a couching 
lion with human head, embodied, perhaps, their emblem of 
Psychology and Physiology — a brute and higher nature united 
— a riddle, written in the ideograpliof the EgyjDtian Priest and 
Philosopher — the Sphinx, the mystery of human existence. 

It was an old que^on JoPg befor;e the Sphinx had been 
cut from the rock. The Pig Yeda Hymns, hoary with antiq- 
uity while Sanscrit was a living tongue, show that man has 
been pondering upon the mystery of his being from the time 
of the earliest record of his thoughts. It was the question of 
questions — -What am I ? Where aln I ? 

We find ourselves existing in a world consisting of sub- 
stances called matter, which are acted upon by various forces. 
All the phenomena of the material world are conditions of mat- 
ter occasioned by these forces. We distinguish matter, force 
and phenomena as separate things. 

Our knowledge of matter is not of the most satisfactory 
kind, and metaphysicians have indulged in some very abstruse 
speculations on the sul>ject. 

A contact with matter originates certain imjDressions in 
our minds. We consider these impressions and form an opin- 
ion in regard. to the object with which they are connected. 
The uniform sequence of the object and a certain impression 



establishes their relationship ; and the opinion which we form 
of the object, bj inspecting the impression, is sufficiently cor- 
rect for the ordinary purposes of life. 

Reasoning from such information as our senses bring in, 
we conclude that matter has a property which we call exten- 
sion, or resistance, or form. It is difficult to regard these three 
terms as exj)ressing three distinct properties ; for Form seems 
to be merely a condition of Extension, and Extension an infer- 
ence drawn from observing that the points of resistance are 
continuous with each other. The absolute sensation is from 
resistance in the object ; the other two properties are inferences 
and nothing more. 

If we had more and different senses, we might obtain other 
classes of impressions, indicating other properties, and thus 
gain farther knowledge, or at least have the means of forming 
a greater variety of inferences in regard to what matter actually 
is. The early voyagers, who set sail upon a chartless ocean and 
followed the sun to learn something of unknown lands, could 
gain a positive knowledge of the form of the earth and recon- 
struct their system of geography. But in our exploration of 
matter we seem to grope and puzzle over it. We approach it 
in the dark and coast along its shores," touching here and there 
to make discoveries. Its dim and misty outlines seem measure- 
less in extent, and we attempt in vain to explore its interior. 

By observing the phenomena which are occurring we be- 
come convinced that they are caused by certain agencies which 
we term Forces. Their behavior is uniform; always occasion- 
ing the same results, and their actions form the system which, 
for the sake of terminology, is called '' The Laws of Matter." 

Although we know nothing of these forces, except by in- 
ference from their effects, we regard them as separate agencies, 
or powers distinguishable from each other. Gravitation, Chem- 
ical Affinity, Life, are some of these forces. iSTo one pretends 
to know all of the foi'ces, or to know all the conduct of any one 
force. Of the forces themselves, separately from their effects, 
and as entities or energies, no idea whatever can be formed. 



That they exist is an obvious fact, and it is equally certain 
that they are not the matter upon which they act, nor the con- 
dition or phenomena which their action produces. A fall- 
ing body has a motion given to it by the force of gravita- 
tion ; and this motion is the condition, and the force is the 
cause of the condition, and neither of them are the thing 
moved. In other words, force, motion and matter are distinct 
terms. 

The earth is rushing forwards in its orbit with a speed ex- 
ceeding sixteen miles a second, and has the tremendous mo- 
mentum which such velocity gives to such a mass of matter. 
The force required to deflect the motion of this ponderous body 
from a rectilinear course, and curb it into a continuous circle, 
is perhaps within the range of mathematical calculation, but the 
figures which might express it w^ould seem almost unmeaning, 
so enormous is the power which they denote. Immense as this 
force must be, we have no reason to conclude that it is greater 
than the force with which the atoms of the molecule cling to 
each other. The energy of the forces, w^h ether acting upon 
cosmic bodies, or upon atoms, cannot be compared, and seems 
to be irresistable. 

These forces have a complicated interaction with each 
other, and one is sometimes converted into another. This trans- 
formation is called " The Correlation of Forces." 

These changes are so incomprehensible that some pro- 
found students have expressed a doubt whether the different 
forces were not different modes of action of some single poten- 
tialty or energy. 

Heat, Light, Electricity and Magnetism can be changed 
into each other, or into motion ; and motion reconverted into 
any of them. Grravitation and Heat seem very dissimilar 
forces ; almost opposite in effect — one causing attraction and 
the other repulsion of atoms. Yet, when the motion of a fall- 
ing body is suddenly stopped, heat manifests itself. Gravita- 
tion, w^hicli is the force causing the motion, becomes changed 
into another force, known as Heat ; and it has been proved, by 



actnal experiment, tliat the Heat and the Gravitation form a 
precise equation — nothing is lost in the change. 

The forces are probably coeval with matter, and they ap- 
pear to be indestructible, and will doubtless continue to perform 
their agencies as long as matter shall exist. 

They are the invisible, intangible, mysterious mechanism 
which produces the phenomena of the material world. Tiiey 
are contrived with such infinite wisdom and forethought that 
they accomplish the far-reaching purposes of their Great Maker 
by operations which seem to be independent of Him, and en- 
tirely automatic. The tremendous 2^0 wer and consumuate reg- 
ularity of these actions have led some men to believe tliat these 
forces were intelligences, or impulses, from an Almighty Being, 
indwelling in matter, and that matter was tlie body of Deity. 
This is the theology of Pantheism. 

H our solar system was once, as some imagine it to have 
been, a nebulous mass, containing all tlie substances and energies 
which still remain there, it would seem to have possessed from 
the beginning full capacities for organizing that' chaos, and 
forming it into the harmony of the spheres. 

Matter and force are indestructible ; and if we admit that 
they contain within themselves the mechanism which has 
wrought out their present form of creation, and that they will 
survive the systems which they have evolved, then it is not 
absolutely incredible that these processes of alternate chaos and 
system, each of enormous duration, may be extended in a fu- 
ture beyond the limits of thought. 

Pondering over such possibilities, we attempt with awe 
to conceive of the iniinite power and wisdom of the Almighty 
Being who made this creation, and endowed it with capacity to 
produce its successors in an endless series. 

It is true that we cannot comprehend how such a creation 
could contain within itself the power of reproduction. A tree 
has that capacity, and we witness the continued re-creation of 
trees, by their own acts, without distrust or wonder. Who un- 
derstands this power, or the mechanism of its action ? A Solar 



System and an Oak have no difference in size, or in duration, 
when compared with Infinity. It is as reasonable to believe 
that the one conld produce its successor as that the other 
could. The thing in either case is incomprehensible, and it is 
idle to speculate about possibility of power when the postulate 
implies infinite power, or to disbelieve a thing because we can- 
not understand it. 

Whether we regard the Forces as a peculiar order of mat- 
ter, or as something more subtile in essence than any imagin- 
able substance, they seem to form the connecting link between 
inert matter and some inscrutable power residing outside of 
matter. 

Life is one of the forces, and the one most difficult to inves- 
tigate ; fugitive, intangible, and elusive, when pursued ' by in- 
quiries. All we really know about it is that it causes the 
living thing to perform the functions which make it a living 
thing. 

Some speculators have attempted to correlate it with the 
other forces ; on a theory that by an adroit manipulation they 
could be made to do what life does — that a living being could 
be produced which had no ancestor, and was the offspring of a 
chemical experiment. There is no satisfactory evidence that 
any living thing has been made by such process, or that life 
can be correlated out of any other force, or that it is a com- 
pound of other forces acting in concrete or combination. It 
can exist in their presence, and while it exists it rules the 
atoms forming the living organism, overpowering the other 
forces and holding them in check, but not extinguishing them, 
or dissembling their identities and functions. If they regain their 
normal mastery, death ensues — in other words. Life retires and 
leaves them in control. 

Instead of being a correlate of the other forces. Life is 
their antagonist, and resists them. It selects out of the com- 
mon mass such atoms as it requires, and compels them to serve 
the purposes of the living thing. It relinquishes its hold upon 
them as soon as it has no further use for them, and they become 



inert again. In other words, the original forces resume their 
control whenever the restraint which Life placed over them has 
been withdrawn. 

All of the Forces, with the exception of Life, can be ques- 
tioned by experiment. Chemistry is a compendium or state- 
ment of such experiments, and a description of their results. 
Meclianics, Astronomy, and nearly the whole round of l^atural 
Philosophy or Physics, are propositions in regard to tlie actions 
of these Forces, and are inductions generalized from observa- 
tions. Science is constantly advancing its frontier of knowl- 
edge, and giving out its discoveries for use in the arts. We have 
found how to employ these Forces, because we are able to 
examine their conduct under different conditions, and study 
them by various experiments. 

Life will submit to no questioning. Tlie other Forces^ 
hold the atom with steady grasp, and will not relinquish their 
clutch even when Life has taken the atom under its control. 
But Life seems to be an irregular, flickering Force — a tempo- 
rary and transient master of matter. It baffles all experiment, 
whether made in the laboratory or the dissecting room. 

]^o cunning mixture in crucible or alembic, which the 
withered Alchemist peered into, searching for the Elixir of 
Life ; no instrumental use of the other forces ; no keen hunt 
with microscope or electric battery, has captured the secret, 
or obtained even a glimpse of the mysterious mode of action of 
Life — the rarest and subtlest of the forces ; the only one per- 
haps belonging to both realms — to the material universe and 
to the spiritual universe. 

Every atom of matter composing the organization at the 
moment of death remains the same atom, but it has come un- 
der a new government. Life has abdicated its dominion, and 
the chemical forces have resumed their absolute sovereignty. 
It is the same identical atom, having lost nothing and gained 
nothing which we can detect. But its new^ condition is evident. 
Something has been withdrawn from it, and it was something 
extrinsic and foreign to it — in short, it was Life. In some of 



its phenomena Life seems to possess a kind of intelligence. It 
is not a blind force, bnt appears almost to reason. If the other 
forces belong only to matter, Life would seem to occupy the 
border region between matter and spirit, and to be the connect- 
ing link. 

But whatever" resemblances there may be between Life and 
the other forces, or however much it may differ from them, 
Life is not mind, if we regard Life simply in its connection 
with matter, and as one of the forces acting in the materia] 
world. The acorn, the rhizopod, and man, eacli have Life ; 
and when Life leaves them they become inert matter. Some 
of the chemical actions have resemblances to the operations of 
Life. Atoms discard their associates and form new connec- 
tions, as if they had likes and dislikes. A loose mob arranges 
itself, with militai-y precision, into rank and file as if by word 
of command, and the formations into which they muster them- 
selves are always the same. But no one regards the seeming 
volition indicated in the process of crystalization as an action 
of mind ; except in the sense that the force causing it is part 
of the mechanism created by Supreme Mind. The atoms that 
are hastening to form a crystal, or the crystal when formed, 
have nothing which can be called either mind or life. If 
mind can only exist in presence of, or connection with, life, 
we cannot claim that life is unable to exist without mind, 
unless we are prepared to assert that the acorn is a thinking 
being. 

This brings us to the question whether mind is one of the 
Forces, kindred perhaps to life, but of higher degree ; or 
whether it is an existing entity — something which is not mat- 
ter, nor force, but is nevertheless a distinct thing 

In the I'emote times, when the Indo-European nations 
were one faniily, dwelling in the old Ai-yan homestead, and 
forming their speech, their words were not arbitrary signs of 
things, but contained a signiiicant description of the object in 
the name given to it. In the oldest dialect of that language, 
mana^ the word denoting man, signifies also thought, or mind. 



10 

This attribute seemed to distinguish him pre-eminently from 
other animals, and was chosen for his name. 

Tlie Keltic, Teutonic and Roman dialects of that language 
have retained the radical of this word, using it in one or the other 
of its original significations — as in the Welsli, menfhr\ German, 
mann^ and Latin, inenf^. We have separated it into the two w^ords, 
man and mind, but their consonance is obvious. We can also see 
something like a similar process of nomenclature in the words 
mens and manus^ the Roman name for hand — the most efficient 
bodily instrument of the mind. 

Nearly every person will assent to the proposition that he 
is endowed with certain faculties, or capacities, which enable 
him to think, and he calls them his mind. This belief is older 
than the Hindu Bible — old as human thought. The evidence 
to sustain this belief is more direct and positive than any proofs 
which we have of the existence of matter ; and it would be 
more reasonable to doubt the existence of ourselves than to 
doubt the existence of our minds — to doubt our consciousness. 
All our knowledge of matter rests upon secondary evidence, 
and is inferential* It is merely certain conclusions from cer- 
tain impressions coming from certain sensations — an intricate 
chain between the object and subject. But our knowledge that 
mind exists is primary, direct and positive. It is an intuition, 
an act of consciousness, and therefore could not be strengthened 
by any conceivable auxiliary evidence. To question the fact 
would he a logical absurdity. An inquiry necessarily implies 
the existence of the inquirer ; and a negation by tlie mind of 
its own existence is a metaphysical stultification of itself. 

It is not within our present purpose to consider whether 
some of our fellow animals do not possess thinking faculties, 
differing from the human, perhaps, more in degree than kind ; 
nor shall we here attempt to state the distinction between Reason 
and Instinct. 

Of the fact that we have a mind we are absolutely certain ; 
as much so as of our existence. Cogito ergo sum — thinking and 
being are inseparable. Assuming, then, as a self evident fact, 



11 

the existence of mind, is there any evidence whatever that it is 
a material body — some kind of matter? 

The materialist claims that whatever exists is a material 
substance ; and that Life and Intelligence are merely conditions 
of such existence. 

It is probable "that Life was not manifested in this planet 
until after the other forces had been in action for a long 
time. But whenever it came into existence it had a Creator. 
A thing cannot create itself. Whether we assume that the 
matter constituting our earth had inherent in it, at the time of 
its creation, properties which enabled it, by its own spontaneous 
processes, to evolve life ; or whether we assume that life was a 
special act of creation deferred till the conditions of matter 
were suitable for its introduction; in either case the act of 
creating it was the act of something outside of itself, and im- 
plied a Creator — implied an existence anterior to the existence 
of the thing made. If we claim that it created itself, by virtue 
of certain capacities which it possessed, we explain nothing by 
such hypothesis. If the protoplasm could, by its own action, 
convert itself into the cell and begin the process of life, how 
could the atoms arrange themselves into the protoplasm, unless 
life existed before the protoplasm was formed — in other words, 
unless life was not matter, but was a force concomitant with mat- 
ter, and created to serve a certain purpose by its action upon 
matter. Even if it should be conceded that life was inherent in 
matter from the beginning, and was one of its properties, then 
matter did not, by its own processes, make this property, but 
its creator was the Being who made matter, and at the same 
time made this particular property of matter. To say that 
intelligence or mind is nothing but matter, involves a contra- 
diction of terms, and confounds definitions. It is possible for 
Omnipotence to have created matter with capacities for pro- 
cesses of thought. And it is possible, simply because Onmipo- 
tence has no limit to its power. The materialist claims that 
mind is nothing but a condition, a state of matter ; in other 
words, that matter can think, reason, love, hate and feel remorse. 



: 12 

What is intelligence or mind ^ The universe of matter 
is governed by fixed laws. Mind involves volition, and acts 
by its own discretion. It reasons, foresees, elects, and is not 
an uncliangeable median ical cause, producing an unvarying 
conduct. Its actions seem to indicate tliat its nature or essence 
must have some kinship with the Being who created matter, 
rather than with matter itself. 

The materialist will admit that he possesses a mind, or the 
capacity of thinking. The Great First Cause is a thinking Be- 
ing. The order and system of His universe show that He must 
be a Thinking Being. Unless it is claimed that God is matter, 
there is no reason for claiming that thought is matter. If God 
is matter, tlien matter is God, and the only logical conclusion 
is, that we being matter, are Gud also. We must either admit 
that we are the Deity, and therefore. Eternal, or deny our ex- 
istence entirely. 

It is easier for the materialist to deny his own existence than 
to believe that his mind is a material body, acted ujDon mechan- 
ically by fixed laws; and that he has no power to reason or 
elect, but is driven forward l)y a blind necessity, like the force 
which drives a locomotive. His consciousness contradicts such 
a pro2)osition. 

We are not warranted in assuming the mind to be a ma- 
terial body, unless we can discover something in it which indi- 
cates that it is matter. All we knoW;of matter is that certain 
properties are inseparable from it. We know of no matter 
which has not extension or form, and we say, therefore, that 
matter cannot exist without extension and form. If the mind 
has not extension and form, it lacks what it would have if it 
was a material substance. Is"o one imagines that the mind is 
something which gravitation and the chemical, or other 
forces, can act upon ; or that it lias a single property in 
common witli matter, or even analogus to it. Thought is a 
bodiless, formless entity ; existing in apparent independence 
of the Physical Laws ; moving at will throughout space, and 
to call it matter is a contradiction of our definition of mat- 



13 

ter. It is the same as saying, mind is matter because it is 
not matter. 

It may be objected tliat we can know nothing of a tiling 
which has no foi'm or sn])stance. We can know of the exis- 
tence of a thing, or fact, which we cannot comprehend or mi- 
derstand. We know that tlie physical forces and Life exist, 
but we cannot comprehend them, in the sense of understanding 
why, and how, they can perform their functions. Or, to take 
a school boy illustration, we know that a certain decimal frac- 
tion w^ill give us an endless succession of figures. We admit 
that we cannot comprehend an .iniinity of any kind, but we 
know that this succession will be an infinite series. We are 
positive of this fact, because our reason has become satisfied that 
this conclusion is a mathematical and absolutely logical certainty. 

If mind is not a material thing, it must be a force, or some- 
thing which is neither matter nor force — a spirit. If we at- 
tempt to include mind in the family of the Forces, we observe 
that it has no features of resemblance to any of them. Life 
seems most like it, but with mere physical life it has nothing in 
common. 

Mind differs from the Forces in a most distinctive quality, 
separating them by an impassable frontier — it has loill. 

They are all blind, unreasoning necessities, doing their of- 
fices without haste or rest or weariness ; grasping the atoms 
with a quiet but terrific energy which appalls the imagination. 
They work like some tremendous machinery, but all of their 
operations are involuntary. They do what they were made to 
do, and they do it because they have no power not to do it. 
They cannot think. They cannot will. 

We are conscious that we can think, and that we have vo- 
lition or will. The mind, therefore, is something unlike a 
mere force — something more than a force. The mind being 
neither matter nor force, and yet having an existence, must be 
a Spiritual being. 

It is associated here with a physical body, by the interven- 
tion of the force called Life. The connection of this spiritual 



14 

being witli tliis material body is absolutely incompreliensible. 
It dues not depend npon any particular atoms of matter, for 
tliey come and go incessantly, like the drops of water wliicL. 
form the flowing stream. The IS'ile of the Pharoahs and of 
to-day seems to be the same river, changeless as the Pyramids ; 
but it is only in appearance, nothing of it is the same, but mere 
form. 

If we attempt to discover how the mind and body are con- 
nected, and how an object outside of us becomes an idea or causes 
an idea within our minds, we are completely baffled. We can in- 
spect the apparatus, and imagine some of its processes. For in- 
stance, it is plain enough that the retina of the eye can have a mi- 
nute picture upon it, cast there by the object at which the eye is 
looking; it is also plain enough that a little nerve goes from the 
retina back into a certain part of the brain ; it is plain enough 
that other little nerves come to this place in the brain ; it is 
plain enough that the brain is a soft substance, having no par- 
ticular organization — a strange, semi-fluid mass of uninter- 
preted convolutions ; and this nerve and brain matter can be 
cross-examined by the chemist and microscopist, and most of its 
constituents made known ; yet what does all this inform us 
upon the subject matter of inquiry, as to how the object caused 
the idea ? This seems to be the apparatus employed in the pro- 
cess ; and we may talk about it as- if it was some curious contriv- 
ance like a telegraph office, with wires and currents of electric- 
ity, but who has discovered how it works ? Who can explain 
the incomprehensible mystery of the process by which a mate- 
rial object can give rise to an idea % 

We can examine the apparatus, but we cannot see the 
Spiritual Being who uses it, and whose way, or manner of 
using it, we cannot by any scrutiny discover, or even con- 
jecture. 

Some writers, influenced, perliaps unconsciously, by the 
theories of the materialists, claim that every impression and 
idea originates some action and causes a change among the 
atoms forming the brain ; either causes, or results, from such 



15 

change, and registers itself in the tissues permanently. They at- 
tempt to explain memory upon such an assumption, and treat the 
act of memory as if it consisted in looking at these prints of ideas 
in some repository wdiere they were kept. Nothing discovered 
in the brain gives the slightest support to this theory. 

It was a mere fancy, suggested by the donble meaning of 
tlie word impression, as if it implied some physical action. 
Until w^e can see a thought, and watch the action of the brain 
while the thought is being originated, w^e can know nothing 
about t;he process. Even if we could see the whole operation, 
it would still remain incomprehensible — the why^ the how un- 
explained and unknown. 

All efforts to understand the connection of mind and brain 
are vain. All we know is that the mind exists, and has a con- 
nection with the body. Ilospes com£sque. This strange, mys- 
terious Spiritual Being, the human mind, has its home, its 
gymnasium and workshop in the brain. The brain is its 
abiding place, but is not itself. It can regard its bodily com- 
panion objectively, and as something distinct and separate from 
itself ; compare it with other external things ; compel it to do 
its bidding ; nmtilate it, or even kill it. 

It can withdraw its attention from external matters and 
busy itself about its own affairs, its subjectivity ; notice mes- 
sages brought in by the senses, or disregard them ; look over 
its collection of ideas, and jDut them in order, by arranging to- 
gether tliose that belong together, and classifying them — what 
is termed generalization. 

It can search for some idea wdiich has been mislaid in its 
memory. It can become a kind of deliberate assembly, and ar- 
range opposite propositions against eacli other in order to come 
to some decision in regard to the matter in question. It can 
suspend its customary occupation, and direct its attention to 
itself — watch its association of ideas, its processes of thought — 
its machinery, so to speak ; to discover how its faculties perform 
their functions, and whether such faculties are analogous to 
what in the body act as organs ; whether reason, understand- 



• 16 

ing, memory and will are individual and distinct parts of the 
mind, appropriated to their particular functions, or are merely 
special actions of an indivisible and homogenous whole. 

But. no stretch of attention, no profound introspection, 
no process of thought, can give the mind any positive knowl- 
edge of its own subtle and mysterious nature. The eye cannot 
see itself, and the mind cannot perform its own autopsy. Its 
knowledge of itself is altogether inferential, indirect and sec- 
ondary — mere theories, and if it pursues the inquiries, they 
lead into endless mazes of metaphysical speculations. This 
region of science is in the border land between matter and 
spirit ; a shadowy, obscure realm, dividing the visible from the 
invisible universe. Nothing but death can carry us over that 
frontier, or raise the curtain which shuts out from us a view of 
the spiritual state of being. 

Can the existence of this spiritual being be terminated '^ 
Is it mortal ? 

With the Greeks, Soul and Butterfly were expressed in 
the word Psyche. The dull, gross caterpillar, which had be- 
conie transformed into a winged, serial being, and rose into the 
sunshine, palpitating with a new life, suggested the metaphor 
expressed in the name. The tigure of this creature was a 
favorite emblem upon their tombs. 

Death is a term which denotes a mere negation. It means 
that Life has ceased. Life, in regard to the -body, is a contin- 
uous movement of atoms of matter, which are brought into the 
organization, perform some service and are discharged. Life 
being the force which causes these operations, Death their ces- 
sation. 

The body l)eing composed of these atoms which are com- 
ing and going incessantly ; each atom dies when it ceases to 
belong to the living organization, as al)sohitely as the whole 
body dies when Life ends. All the paiticulir atoms Avliich 
composed the Ix'dy formerly liave died and been replaced by 
their substitutes. The human body retains its form md iden- 
tity, but changes every atom of matter which makes that form. 



17 

The process of life is a continuous death, and the end of life is 
the end of death. 

Yet even as to the m:itter composing the body, there is no 
death in the sense of annihilation — nothingness. Tlie atoms are 
not struck out of being. They merely change their condition 
of being, their relationship to each other as to juxtaposition, 
and remain in existence. The accurate knowledge of modern 
times has found that no existing thing, whether we call it mat- 
ter or force, is ever annihilated. 

The Physicist assumes the continuity of the existence of 
matter as an indisputable fact. That a thing can become noth- 
ing, or that nothing can become a thing, are alike unthinkable. 
All of the physical phenomena with which we are acquainted 
contradict such a proposition ; and if we regard it as abstract 
metaphysical speculation it is an impossible conclusion. 

But the changes in the substance composing the material 
body, w^hicli death introduces, furnishes no evidence that mind 
can die. They do not even offi^r that make-shift of proof 
which we term analogy. Death to the mind could mean noth- 
ing short of absolute annihilation. 

If mind is an Existing Thing — a Spiritual Being — then 
the laws of Physics and of Logic forbid the possibility of its 
extinction — its becoming a nothing. 

Its existence does not depend upon such conditions as life 
and death imply in regard to the body. 

We cannot conceive it to be composed of spiritual atoms, 
which come into it, or go out of it in its process of being ; and 
which, when it dies, are distributed back into some spiritual 
mass, so that death only implies the disintegration and release 
of these atoms, and then from such assumed analogy reason 
that spiritual death means not annihilation, but a mere change 
of condition in the spiritual atoms composing the mind. A 
spiritual atom is an inconceivable idea. 

Even if we should admit that such a process w^as possible, 
and that there might be such a thing as a spiritual atom, it 
would not help the question. Such decomposition and disper- 



18 

sion of these spiritual atoms would be the death of the mind as 
evidently as an analogous process in the matter of the body 
is the deatli of the body. 

The life of the mind is consciousness, and if it wei e com- 
posed of particles they would be particles of consciousness, a 
preposterous, unthinkable proposition 

Mind is thought. There is no evidence that thought is 
composed of spiritual atoms, or of anything having any resem- 
blance, or even analogy to any material substance. The whole 
universe has probably no two creations so unlike as matter and 
mind. 

1^0 stretch of the imagination can conceive of a spiritual 
being subject to death — a being of rare," subtile, indescribable 
and almost inconceivable nature ; formed without matter ; sub- 
ject to none of the physical laws ; independent of time and 
space ; having no need of senses ; composed of nothing but 
faculties and capacities ; ranging at will through the universe ; 
with powers and attributes of which we can form no compre- 
hension — what reason have we to suppose that such a being 
must die ? ^Nothing else in all the universe ceases to be. This 
spiritual creature is the crowning act, the consummate flower ; 
having an essence making it kindred in nature with Him who 
made it. A dim and faint resemblance — such as the finite 
might have to the infinite — differing beyond all comparison in 
degree, but not in kind, yet enough to show that it belonged 
to the great congregation of immortal spirits ; created with 
power and attributes which fitted it to pass anywhere through 
the infinity of space and the infinity of time. 

The continuity of our personal existence is a part of our 
consciousness. 'No other evidence of it is necessary or possible. 
With rare exceptions, no man in any condition of society, at 
any time, has doubted his continued identity — or that death 
was merely a change in his mode of existence. Some have 
fancied that this life was not their beginning, and that they 
had dim and vague reminiscenses like dreams or shadows of a 
former life. The Hindoo framed this belief into his theology. 



19 

Wordsworth lias given utterance to this mysterious conscious- 
ness of a former being in one of the most beautiful things in 
our language : 

" Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting ; 
The soul that rises with us, our life's star, 
Hath elsewhere had its setting, 
And Cometh from afar," 

This dream of a poet tempts one to indulge a moment in 
the train of speculations which it suggests. It is the utterance 
of an old popular belief in one of its shades or aspects. 

The human family have always had a kind of vague, 
indistinct consciousness of the presence of spiritual beings. 
Sacred and Pagan history ; the Hebrew and the English Stat- 
ute Laws ; all grades of culture, from the Congo negro to Chief 
Justice Hale ; men of all religions, and of no religion, have ac- 
knowledged a belief in the supernatural. It is the fashion now 
among a large class of educated men to n^gard such opinions 
as mere vagaries, or semi-lunacies. 

But are we quite sure that this very old sentiment, or in- 
stinct, is an idle superstition, having nothing to support it but 
fireside tales of timid ignorance ? The testimony would settle 
any other question but this. 

How can we assure ourselves that this strange feeling, 
which we call a presentiment, or nervousness, is not one of the 
unexplained processes of our complex nature ? The impres- 
sions originating these thoughts may be obtained through some 
germinal, undeveloped means of knowledge, which will hereafter 
become perfect organs, giving access to the things of the spirit- 
ual world, and performing such offices in that regard as our 
present senses discharge in our intercourse with matter. 

There is a spiritual universe, and we inhabit it. It fills 
infinity. What it is, what may be its construction or cosmos, 
we cannot even conjecture. Its living beings may be about us, 
but we have no intercourse with them, and no sense of their 
presence — unless, perhaps, those indefinable impressions which 
we term superstition, may be a kind of imperfect intercourse. 



20 

We attempt in vain to form some idea of tliis invisible 
creation which prevades all space. We can guess that like 
the material world, it may have inert and active things analo- 
gous to what we term matter and force, but most unlike them 
in their essence ; things infinite in variety, compound and com- 
plex in action. Conceive of a universe in which its substances, 
its matter, are Thoughts, and its forces the laws of Thought ; 
strange, mysterious agencies outside of Thought, acting upon it 
in various but unchanging ways, and producing an endless sys- 
tem of intellectual phenomena. 

In our present condition of existence we have some vague 
and uncertain theories concerning what we term the laws of 
thought. In metaphysics we build up our tentative and doubt- 
ful conclusions upon a pile of shifting postulates and reasons. 
In the exact sciences we climb, step by step, up a ladder of 
figures and calculations to reach a mathematical truth. We creep 
and cannot soar. Our faculties make questions incomprehen- 
sible to us, which may hereafter be clear and simple. Propose 
a problem in geometry or the calculus to a Chimpanzee and 
do not wonder that we cannot comprehend now questions which 
belong to our higher plane of being — nor doubt that we shall 
comprehend them hereafter. 

In that other state of being we shall no longer depend 
upon our senses for information, but knowledge will be an in- 
tuition. All the properties and capacities and possibilities of 
matter and fo'rce will be known, witliout study or experiment, 
at a glance. The inner essence of these things ; perhaps the 
inscrutable secret of their genesis will declare itself. We can 
pass from such subjects to a higher range of inquiry — to the 
laws governing a spiritual universe ; right ; the relations of 
motives and conduct ; the mystery of free agency and fore-knowl- 
edge; of evil and pain — profound, far-reaching speculations. 
]!^ow we grope blindly to understand propositions which seem to 
have a necessary existence, and which also seem to be flat con- 
tradictions — moral impossibilities. We wander in the mazes 
where such inquiries lead, and become lost in metaphysical bogs. 



21 

They will be plain and simple then ; the foundation of 
future knowledge ; an alphabet to the higher studies. Eternity 
will not exhaust or dull the interest of these employments. 
What we call now Intellectual Philosopy, will be the Physics 
in that course, opening to the higher range of thought — to the 
supreme science of Moral Philosopy, with God for Teacher. 

It is probable that man in that state of his existence will 
develope his innate and ultimate capacities, and give significance 
to the declaration that he was made in the likeness of his Crea- 
tor. We have no intimation that Angels have growth. As 
they were created so they remain — beautiful, powerful, glorious 
Beings, of changeless nature — " Sons of the Morning." After 
them man was made, and from the beginning he has been an 
incomprehensible jnystery to thera. He was an intelligent being, 
and he was an immortal being. He was tried by temptation, 
which his Creator permitted. He was compelled to breathe an 
atmosphere poisoned with sin and evil, and he was doomed to 
suffer death. They pondered the question^ why did God make 
him ? 

To deepen the mystery surrounding man and his destiny, 
a, greater wonder was presented to their observation. A Being 
of higher nature than even the archangels — The Son'of God — 
became a man ; was tried by human temptations ; shared a 
human nature ; and died a human death. Sin and death are 
something which they could not understand. Christ's part in 
the matter w^as the mystery of mysteries. Man has been God's 
problem, and the Angels could not solve it. The lines of human 
events are not shot forth at random, but projected with pro- 
found purpose, under laws which belong to the Geometry of 
Ethics. They stretch beyond view in^p an undisclosed future. 
We see but little of them, and they seem to construct no rela- 
tions and to have no meaning. Under the eye of the Supreme 
Being they are a finished diagram displayed upon the great 
vault of the ages, and standing out distinct before Him from 
the beginning. They demonstrate the hidden intent of this last 
act of creating Will. Hereafter we shall see this diagram. 



22 

What is to be the final destiny of a Being having such a 
genesis and history? Such a connection witli the Supreme 
Being ? God's relation to all other created beings — even to the 
Angels, is that of Sovereignty — but to man he has a closer re- 
lation, a kinship — and it is Fatherhood. Wliy may we not be- 
lieve that hereafter, in the endless eons of eternity, this creature, 
so fallible and imperfect now, may rise higher than all others in 
the Heavenly Host, and stand nearest to The Supreme. 

These are mere speculations now. The dull, gross prison- 
house of matter incarcerates us, and shuts out any view of that 
world. We live as if it had no existence, even in specula- 
tion. We shall know more of it in a short time, sooner than 
many expect. 

Our journey through life may be in pleasant places, and 
with gay companions, sauntering and idling along, an epicurian 
philosophy, finding its highest enjoyment and its supreme 
good in its present employments. But for each of ns is the 
same dark valley to be traversed alone, and at its end the fear- 
ful Spectre standing by the closed door. The trembling mor- 
tal has no choice, he must advance. A touch from that dreaded 
hand changes the whole universe like a flash of light. The 
mortal has become immortal, and this Sj)ectre a kindly Angel, 
crowned with amaranth, who welcomes home this new Guest. 

Note. — The writer has appropriated from others whatever suited his 
purpose, deeming the authorship of such matters so well know that a cita- 
tion of authorities was unnecessary. 



THE FAMILY OF ISAAC, 



The life of Isaac js a remarkable biography. In tlie Bible 
gallery of portraits, this is a singular and peculiar face. His 
history gives us the life of a man who did not seem to belong 
to his times or his race. A son of the bold, energetic man who 
founded the family, dwelling in a border region where war 
was a normal condition of society, he never saw a iield of battle, 
nor shed the blood of a human being. Polygamy was the 
custom of the world, and he remained a monogamist. There 
were great cities within easy reach, but he never visited them. 
Tie had no mishaps, or temptations, or adventures. His long 
life was a calm and gentle voyage on a summer sea. 

He was born the heir to a great estate, which he was to 
share with no one. Jrle gave himself no concern in regard to 
his wild and roving half-brother Ishmael. Abraham had settled 
that matter, and he was not a man who changed his purposes. 

Isaac had no motives for exertion, and no opportunity. 
Abraham managed affairs autocratically, and was absolute in 
his household. Isaac enjoyed in a quiet way his extraordinary 
advantages. After the death of Abraham the family estate 
continued to accumulate. It grew by its own strength, as 
all great estates have a tendency to do. Isaac was a prudent 
and cautious owner, who directed operations which had received 
their force and momentum from his father. He was the son 
of a rich man, and he was neither a fool nor a prodigal. 

We have such men among us now. They could not create 
an estate, but they know how to keep it. They never specu- 
late or take risks. They gather where they have not sowed, 
and they carefully nurse their property. They are satisfied 
with the conditions of society, and opposed to excitements or 
changes. In politics they are conservatives and resist new 
measures with all the weight of their inertia. Wealth and 



24 

blameless habits give them social distinction, and thev are " solid 
men." They build churches and head subscriptions for chari- 
ties. We always place them on the platform when public 
meetings are held. They live a life of dignified and decorous 
self indulgence. If somewhat exigent in regard to their per- 
sonal ease and comfort, they are valuable members of society. 

Ishmael was the oldest son of Abraham, and his only son 
for about thirteen yeai"s. He overflowed with animal spirits, 
and was of the wild and untamable nature which characterize 
his descendants. Abraham was strongly attached to him, and 
perhaps a little blind to his faults. The boy was a noisy, mis- 
chievous, playful ]ad, whose pranks had been the amusement and 
worry of the family. The last of these exploits sent him adrift. 

Shortly after the birth of Isaac, a festival was given to 
celebrate that event. It is in keeping w^ith what is known of 
the relations that existed betweeen tlie mothers of the two 
boys, to infer that Sarah apprised Ishmael of the significance 
of the thing in reference to himself, and of the wide difference 
between the son of the bondwoman and the true heir. It w^as 
a proceeding of peculiar interest to Ishmael, and not particularly 
gratifying. He had often before heard these allusions to his 
mother's condition. While Sarah was exhibiting, and exulting 
in this unexpected child of her old age, Tshmael was detected 
in the act of ridiculing her, and playing upon the name of 
Isaac, which signified in their language "laughter." Sarah 
resented this allusion to her incredulous laugh when told that 
she would become a mother in her old age. We can imagine 
with what malicious glee this lad fiung out his insulting laugh 
— mimicking in it perhaps her voice. The jeering provocation 
incensed her beyond endurance, and she decided to settle mat- 
ters with this troublesome boy in a summary way. 

" Wherefore she said unto Abraham, cast out this bond- 
woman and her son ; for the son of the bondwoman shall not 
be heir with my son, even with Isaac. 

" And the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight 
because of his son." 



25 

It was the second time tliat lie liad been made to discard 
Islnnael. He had a tender j^lace in his heart for this bold and 
reckless child, who seemed to have no friends but the old patri- 
arch and the bondwoman, his mother. Abraham was wise and 
prudent. Sarah had her way in the matter, and there was 
peace in the family. 

The next mention of Isaac contains an intimation that 
Imman sacrifice was one of the religious rites in Abraham's 
time. The old man and his son go together to the mountain 
where this costly offering is to be made. The boy bears the 
wood, and the father the fire and the knife. Isaac asks but one 
question, and is content with the singular answer, vague to 
him, but fearfully precise and meaning to Abraham. When 
he was laid upon the altar and the knife was raised over him he 
understood the answer. But there was no resistance, no com- 
plaint, and no implorations. Pie was a passive victim. 

Nothing further is said of Inm till tlie time of his mar- 
riage. He seems to have been an unemployed man, one of the 
family household. He took life easily, leaving Abraham to 
control the general interests of that great establishment, and 
Sarah to rule the domestic realm. We see him on the close of 
a certain day walking forth to meditate. He had something 
peculiarly interesting to occupy his fancy. It was the evening 
reverie of a bachelor who was about to become a married man, 
if Abraham's negotiations were successful in that regard. It 
was before the days of photographs, and he could speculate and 
imagine what he pleased. He was a middle-aged man, of very 
quiet and regular habits, and he was probably considering what 
kind of a woman his intended wife might be. 

Abraham was a Chaldean of the elder empire. That re- 
markable people were a fusion of the four great ethnic fajnilies. 
IN'ations formed by the commingling of different races have a 
peculiar vitality and force which cause them to exert a pre- 
dominant influence in the world. Rome and England are ex- 
amples of such nationalities, and our country will probably be 
even more conspicuously a composite people and play a higher 
part than they, in future history. 



26 ' 

Abraliam was of tlie Aramaic or Semitic stem of the Clial- 
dean trunk ; and his house was an important and noble family, 
as their genealogy has been carefully preserved. He belonged 
to the pastoral section of the nation, and was not an inhabitant 
of cities, though familiar with their customs. In modern times 
he would have been a country gentleman of courtly manners. 
His wealth was in flocks and herds which fed on the plains on 
the eastern borders of Chaldea, along the foot hills of the 
mountains. 

His marriage took place when he was about forty years 
old. Some years afterward this entire family — all the kindred 
of Abraham — removed northward. Their journey took them 
to the upper waters of the Euphratus. They drove their flocks 
and herds slowly along the plains, and with their servants and 
retainers, were a formidable host of emigrants. When they 
reached the region known as Padan Aran, in Upper Mesopo- 
tamia, on the frontiers of Armenia, they made a final halt. 
The place still bears the name of Haran, and it is not im- 
probable this was a name given it by Abraham, in memory of 
his brother, who had died in Chaldea, and Avhose son Lot ac- 
companied Abraham. 

The wealth and power of this princely family continued to 
increase. Abraham, who was the boldest and most enterprising 
member of it, went with Lot still further from their original 
home and came at length to Hebron, or Mamre, in Southern 
Palestine. That was the end of the migration, and there he 
placed the family tomb, in testimony that this was his adopted 
country, and that his bones should rest there. 

He became one of the great potentates of that region, a 
powerful Emir or Sheik, able to take the field at the head of an 
army, all of whom were his private servants, born in his house- 
hold. He was regarded by his neighbors as a formidahle man, 
and was envied, and courted, and feared. He might have 
matched his son with the proudest of the reigning families 
about him. 

He had become an old man, and Isaac was forty years of 



21 

age. He deemed it a matter of necessity to make provision 
for tlie contimTaiice of the family, and the transmission of its 
wealth and influence to some heir of his blood. He had re- 
cently heard of Kebecca, a daughter of one of his nephews 
residing at Haran, and that she was a very charming girl. He 
probably informed himself carefully in regard to her before 
deciding to select her for Isaac. She was of Chaldean origin, of 
the same princely stock which he wished to preserve. 

His manner of managing this matrimonial affair illustrates 
the custom of the times, and the peculiar character of the 
man. In his great establishment there was probably more than 
one brisk young gallant who would have been delighted to go 
on such an embassy, and who might have seemed a more be- 
fitting and api^ropriate messenger, than the old steward or 
major-domo who was charged with this delicate negotiation. 
He was as old as his master ; and this w^as something entirely 
outside of his experience and routine of duties. Abraham did 
not deem it prudent to entrust this matter to one of his young 
men, and it does not aj)pear that he consulted Isaac on the sub- 
ject, the person of all others who might be supposed to have a 
particular interest in the affair. 

Eleazar seems to have found this novel undertaking a 
very embarrassing one, and he pondered and puzzled over it 
as he journeyed towards Armenia. At last he decided upon 
his plan of operations. One of the pleasantest pictures of the 
customs of those times is the account of his interview with 
Kebecca, and how^ the vicarious wooing was conducted. It pre- 
sents a photographic view of domestic life in patriarchal days ; 
in the region which was probably the earliest home of the 
human race. Distance dims and softens objects, and that period 
has hanging over it a kind of vague romance which belongs to 
the East, and the Past — to Eothen. We see the evening well, 
the flocks about it, the girls drawing water and gossi23j)ing with 
each, other, the frank and innocent intercourse of a pastoral 
people. Partly from an indistinct tradition, but mostly from 
mere fancy, poets have given pictures of the primitive customs 



2g 

and simple manners which belonged to what they termed the 
Golden Age. 

Up to this time we know nothing of Eebecca, Her sub- 
sequent history shows that the Syrian damsel inherited much of 
the ability and energy of her Chaldean ancestry. She was a north- 
ern girl of southern parentage. A beautiful brunette, passionate, 
impulsive, and sharp witted. She had a very decided will. 

Eleazar and her family had come to a definite arrange- 
ment, and nothing remained but to fix upon the day. The 
old servant was anxious to return home and finish his part 
of the transaction. He was urging with much formal polite- 
ness the necessity of naming an early day, and Jier family 
were fencing with him upon that point. She assumed the 
female perogative in regard to that question, and came to his 
assistance by announcing her readiness to go immediately. She 
promptly mounted her camel, and Eleazar accomplished the 
purpose of his mission, doubtless to his great relief. 

Bible names were always significant, often prophetic. In 
our language Rebecca would be "the Ensnarer." She was a 
country girl, but she belonged to a leading family, and she pro- 
bably had the accomplishments which were ajDpropriate to her 
station. She had been reared upon the hills and in the open 
air, and was full of life and spirit. She was also a kinswoman 
of Abraham, ambitious, daring and resolute; witli the hot 
blood of Shinaar in lier veins. What she willed to do, she 
never failed to attempt, and her keen wit and resolute purpose 
were rarely bafiled or defeated. Centuries afterwards, when 
her children had won and lost an empire, and were subject to 
Rome, women like her, beautiful, wilful, determined, governed 
the kings and tetrarchs who ruled subjugated Judea. 

Isaac and Rebecca were part of the great household of 
Abraham, and nothing is said of them during the first twenty 
years after their marriage. Their temperaments were most un- 
like, and they were complements of each other. He calm, 
gentle, averse to strife ; she, keen, passionate and wily — a very 
charming woman, who knew liow to manage her husband. 



^9 

Abraliam continued to increase in wealtli and power. He 
was one of the great Sheiks of tliat region ; who held inter- 
course hke a sovereign with neighboring rulers, and whose 
stately bearing and courtly manners proclaimed him a natural 
nobleman. He ruled his household in a grand, patriarchal way, 
and was busied with important affairs, in which he asked no 
assistance and sought no advice. Isaac seems to have had noth- 
ing to do. He was merely one of Abraham's family ; at liberty 
to amuse himself as he could, but not called upon to be useful. 

For twenty years Isaac and Kebecca remained childless. 
He had reached the age of sixty years, and Abraham was more 
than one hundred and fifty years old. If the family should 
become extinct its great possessions would be scattered among 
strangers, and the purpose of his life defeated. He apparently 
began to distrust the promise that his line should be continued 
through Isaac, for he took other wives to himself, and old as he 
was, had other sons born to him. 

At length Isaac and Rebecca become parents, and this seems 
to have settled the question with the old patriarch. He gave 
portions to these subsequent sons, these contingent heirs, and 
sent them into the eastern country to shift for themselves. 
They are probably the ancestors of the wandering Bedawin 
who still inhabit those regions. They were of the same blood 
which flowed in the veins of Ishmael, and they betook them- 
selves to the same predatory life. 

At length the long and busy career of the grand old man 
comes to an end. His two sons, Ishmael and Isaac, bury him. 
Isaac is an old man and Ishmael still older. He comes from 
the desert, a wild, swarthy Sheik, whose reckless, rollicking 
boyhood had matured into a restless and daring manhood — a 
roving robber in Syrio- Arabia ; whose hand was against every 
man, and every man's hand against him. 

This seems to have been the first time these brothers had 
met since the christening of Isaac. They were two strangely 
incongruous mourners — the calm, gentle Isaac, and the tameless 
Ishmael — the Quaker and the Bandit. 



30 

Islimael, with all his faults, loved and reverenced Abraham, 
and with the exception of Abraham and his mother, loved no 
one. He scorned all peaceful occupations, and lived by his 
sword. 

The two old men carried Abraham to his sepulchre, and 
this burial separated the only bond which connected them. 
The Arab chief returned to his desert, while Isaac quietly took 
possession of his great patrimony, and lived with as little con- 
tention as the times would permit. These two men could not 
have dwelt together. They were antipodes — as dissimilar as 
the green hills of Hebron on which the herds of Isaac fattened, 
to the hot shimmering sands over which the bands of Ishmael 
flitted. 

Esau and Jacob were twin brothers, but they were as un- 
like as Isaac and Ishmael. The tinge of Arabia in the blood 
of Abraham, developed fully in Ishmael, showed its traces in 
Esau. Isaac had nothing of it, but his son Esau was half Arab. 

The preference which parents exhibit in some cases seems 
very strange. Es:iu ought to have been his mother's favorite. 
He had her bold and self-reliant spirit. But parents quite fre- 
quently are attached to the child most unlike themselves. , 

Isaac was a quiet, ease-loving man ; she, a scheming, active, 
managing woman ; full of plans, bold and quick witted. 

Jacob was a man of peace, but it was not the contented 
peace of Isaac. He was greedy and envious. He never re- 
sorted to violence to gain his object, but depended upon craft 
and imposition. It may have been this wiliness, this persistent 
thirst for property and position, which made him the favorite 
of Eebecca. The old narrative merely states the fact that he 
was her favorite, and does not explain it. This is the text : 
" And the b oys grew, and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man 
of the Held : and Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in tents. 
And Isaac loved Esau, because he did eat of his venison. But 
Rebecca loved Jacob." 

It is signilicant of Isaac's character that his dinners seem to 
have been important factors in his family relations. Eebecca 



31 

understood tliat matter. Modern society exhibits similar cases. 
Some men who figure upon platforms, and seem to be embodied 
benevolence and equanimity, have very decided opinions in 
regard to their table and other comforts. 

We have only two or three passages in the life of Esau. 
But enough is told to give the prominent features of his char- 
actei", and we can easily form a distinct portrait of the man. 
The biography of Jacob is complete. It is a finished picture, 
by a master hand. 

Esau was a frank, generous, careless man, fond of dangerous 
sports, and with a breezy dash of manner, but by instinct a gentle- 
man. Jacob, a crafty, plausible, thrifty man, who accomphshed 
his principal successes by stratagem and deception. His name 
was significant, the Supplanter. He knew that his elder brother 
was heir to the estate, and he watched for an opportunity to dis- 
place him. 

He was his mother's favorite, and had the benefit of her 
counsel and contrivance. We can imagine how frequently they 
discussed this matter, and the possible ways of setting aside the 
firstborn. It is not improbable that her keen wit suggested 
the contrivance by which Jacob obtained from Esau a release 
of this birthright. Esau often returned from his hunting ex- 
peditions in a famishing condition. This suggested a scheme 
to these plotters to inveigle him into a renunciation of the rights 
wdiicli primogeniture gave him. 

On a certain occasion Jacob found his opportunity. It 
w^as in this wise : 

'' And Jacob sod pottage, and Esau came from the field, 
and he was faint. And Esau said unto Jacob, Feed me I pray 
thee with that same pottage, for I am faint. '" "" ^ 

" Jacob said. Sell me this day tliy birthright. 

" And Esau said, Behold I am at the point to die, and what 
profit will it do me ? 

" And Jacob said, Swear to me this day ; and he swore 
unto him, and he sold his birthright unto Jacob. 



32 

" Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentils, and 
he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way." 

In those regions now, as it was then, hospitality, to a mere 
stranger, is a point of honor, yet Jacob exacted payment from 
a guest who was his twin brother. It Avas safer and cheaper 
to win it by contract than by violence. If he had suffered 
Esau to die of hunger, Isaac would have cursed him as his 
brother's murderer. It is very certain that neither Jacob nor 
Esau thought it to his interest to inform Isaac of this transac- 
tion ; and they both left him to suppose that Esau was entitled 
to the rights of the oldest son. 

Here was a difficulty which Rebecca and Jacob fully ap- 
preciated. It might make the sale ineffectual, and defeat its 
purpose. It was probably the subject of many consultations 
and contrivances. 'No possible plan could be devised. Rebecca 
in the meantime kept watcli over Isaac and Esau, and listened 
at their intetviews. At length she found a way, and it was a 
bold one. This quick witted and resolute woman improvised 
a crafty scheme of imposition, and performed it with consum- 
mate dexterity. It could not have been premeditated, and there 
was no time for rehearsal. 

She heard Isaac send Esau forth to procure venison, and 
prepare a repast, and she surmised that Isaac intended then to 
bestow upon Esau the important benediction which would es- 
tablish his pre-eminence in the family. Slit^ hastily explained 
to Jacob her plan of operations, and he was intimidated, and 
hesitated. If this audacious attempt to obtain the coveted 
blessing by false pretenses should be detected, it would involve 
the formidable penalties of a father's malediction. He wished, 
but did not dare. Rebecca was of sterner stuff. She silenced 
Jacob's objections by the brief adjuration, " Upon me be the 
curse, my son, only obey my voice." 

He was willing that she should suffer in his behalf, and he 
proceeded to disguise himself so as to personate his brother. 
She prepared the outfit for this disguise, ransacking Esau's ap- 



33 

parel for materials. She hastily made ready some food, and 
sent Jacob with it to Isaac. 

In that interview with his f atlier, Jacob not only personated 
a lie, but to direct questions returned false answers. He lied 
to liis blind father for the deliberate purpose of cheating his 
brother. When he had obtained this stolen thing, he hastened 
away, and hid himself. Rebecca was unterriiied. She kept 
him under her wing. 

There is no court in Christendom, or Heathendom, wliich 
would sustain a title won by such a trick ; and in most coun- 
tries, such a mode of obtaining property would send one to a 
penitentiary. 

The return of Esau to his father, and his interview with 
him, is one of the most pathetic narratives in the Old Testa- 
ment. 'No paraphrase of the language can be given without 
injury to the beautiful simplicity of the text : 

" And it came to pass as soon as Isaac had made an end of 
blessing Jacob, and Jacob was yet scarce gone out of the pres- 
ence of Isaac his father, that Esau his brother came in from 
his hunting. And he had made savory meat, and brought it in 
unto his father, and said unto his father, Let my father arise 
and eat of his son's venison, that thy soul may bless me. 

" And Isaac his father said unto him, Who art thou ? 

"And he said, I am thy son, thy firstborn, Esau. 

" And Isaac trembled very exceedingly and said. Who ? 
Where is he that hath taken venison and brought to me, and I 
have eaten of all before thou camest, and have blessed him — 
Yea, and he shall be blessed. And when Esau heard these 
words of his father, he cried with a great and exceeding bitter 
cry, and said unto his father, Bless me, even me also, O my 
father. And he said. Thy brother came with subtlety, and 
hath taken away thy blessing. And he said, Is he not rightfully 
named Jacob, foi* he hath supplanted me these two times. He 
took away my birthright, and now he hath taken away my 
blessing. And he said. Hast thou not reserved a blessing for 
me ? And Isaac answered and said, Behold, I have made him 



34 

tliy Lord, and all of liis brethren I have given to liim for 
servants ; and with corn and wine I have sustained him. And 
what shall I do nnto thee, my son '^ And Esan said nnto 
him, Had'st thon but one blessing, my father ? Bless me also, 
even me, O my father. And Esaii lifted up his voice and wept." 

Shortly after this transaction Jacob left home to avoid 
Esan. His mother planned the thing, and by artful complaints 
about Esau's wife, induced Isaac to send Jacob to his relatives 
in Padan-Aran. It was a long journey. His arrival there and 
first interview with Rachel is a charming story. He met a 
beautiful girl at evening at the shepherd's well. It was the 
same well which his mother had so often described, and his 
cousin Rachel was like a dream of youth ; more beautiful he 
thought than even his mother when she came on some such 
evening to that same well. 

A love scene in Syria, or Spain, or England, is the same 
old story, the same melody in different words. Jacob and Rachel 
were at the time of life which is its season of blossoms — its 
brief holiday of romance. In his case it seems to have lasted 
several years. He became an inmate of her father's family, 
performing certain services, and the narrator says, with a kind 
of quaint and naive simplicity, and " they seemed to him but a 
few days, on account of the love he liad for Rachel." 

He remained with Laban twenty years, and his father-in- 
law seems to have been a sharp business man. It was a family 
trait. He imposed upon Jacob an unexpected wife, and changed 
his contract as to Jacob's wages ten times. He resorted to 
various expedients to gain an advantage, but Jacob was ecpal 
to him, and able to turn these contrivances against Laban, and 
use them for his own advantage. Llis wealth increased, and 
the family began to regard him as a secret enemy. Perhaps 
they had a superstitious dread, that in some underhanded man- 
ner, he would become, what his name imported, a supplanter. 

During these twenty years nothing is said of Esau. He 
was probably one of the household of Isaac, the head of the 
Sept. At all events he lived within view of his mother, for 
his wives annoyed her. She probably expressed her opinion 



35 

in regard to them with some emphasis. She had the adroit- 
ness to make them the means of inducing Isaac to send Jacob 
to Padan-Aran. 

" And Rebecca said to Isaac, I am weary of my hf e because 
of the dangliters of Heth (Esau's wives) ; if Jacob takes a wife 
of the daughters of Ileth, such as -those which are the daughters 
of the land, what good sliall my Kfe do me ?" A very old case 
of a common question, known now as the mother-in-law question. 

The Turks have a proverb — " Eat and drink with your 
friends, but do no business with them." Jacob's business re- 
lations with his wives' family had become disagreeable, and he 
decided to break up the connection and return to the old home- 
stead. 

His mode of operations to accomplish this object, and secure 
his share of the proj)erty, was wary and cautious, giving him 
the appearance of being an absconding debtor. He removed 
all of his own property, and his wives succeeded in carrying 
away some of their father's choicest things. It was a critical 
time with Jacob. Laban was pursuing him with hue and cry, 
and the end of his flio^ht was to be an encounter with Esau, 

The meeting of these twin-brothers is another one of the 
Bible pictures ; a vivid and picturesque presentation of these two 
men so dissimilar to each other. Jacob came like a self-accused 
culprit, humble, deprecatory, and obsequious ; bringing gifts, 
imploring safety. Esau met him as if no cloud had ever dark- 
ened their intercourse. He made no allusions to any wrongs. 
He opened his arms to him, and welcomed him home. He was 
a high-spirited, outspoken and generous man, the favorite son 
of his father. He never upbraided his mother for her conspi- 
racy with Jacob against him. "When he found that his mar- 
riage offended his parents, he made other alliances, and endeav- 
ored to mend matters by bringing home a wife taken from 
the kindred of his parents. 

He had become a man of wealth and personal influence in 
his father's time. Though not the head of the house, he was 
a great Sheik, one of the leaders, or potentates, in that border 



36 

land, whose descendants, for more than fifteen centuries, held 
the fastnesses in Idumea, which Isaac, in his prophetic blessing, 
had given to his eldest son. The red pOrphyritic rocks gave 
the name of Edom to the mountains, and there the children of 
Esau dwelt, and cherished the memory of the wrong which Jacob 
had done to their ancestor. They were the inveterate enemies 
of the Jews, often beaten down, never subdued, and at length 
able to glut their vengeance in the sack of Jerusalem. Esau 
could forgive Jacob, but the children of Esau never forgot that 
the children of Jacob had stolen their heritage. 

When these brothers met, both of them remembered the 
circumstances under which they parted. Jacob certainly did. 
But he misunderstood his brother's nature, and could not ap- 
preciate it. Esau would take nothing which belonged to Jacob, 
even when it was offered to him. He was incapable of mean- 
ness or deception. Isaac understood him. The quiet and ease- 
loving old man admired tlie active and adventurous qualities of 
Esau, perhaps the more because he had so little of them himself. 

The biography of Rebecca is left unfinislied. There is a 
full, and almost minute account, of the death of Abraham, 
Isaac and Jacob ; of Sarah and Rachel ; even of Deborah, the 
waiting woman of Rebecca, who seems to have been a member 
of Jacob's household. The history of Rebecca ends with the 
account of her conspiracy against Esau. There is nothing to 
show when or where tlie keenest witted and most fascinating 
woman of patriarchal times terminated her career ; and there is 
no mention of the place of her burial, except a remark of ques- 
tionable authority attributed to Jacob when dying. 

The lives and acts of men are the threads in the web of 
human events. The biography of this woman is a part of the 
liistory of her times ; given for the pupose of history, and per- 
liaps with a deeper purpose, which we leave to the conjecture 
of the reader. 

Jacob is a perplexing subject for a layman. In the sacred 
writings he is represented as the favorite man of God. He 
had nearly all the qualities which, by common consent, are 



SI 

condemned. The narrative makes no attempt to disgnise or pal- 
liate tliem. It sets them forth in plain language, making no 
comment npon them, and applying no epithets to him. Such 
a man, in modern times, would be distrusted in business circles, 
and black-balled at the clubs. Indeed, he would be in danger 
of indictment for fraud. 

Dr. Bacon, of 'New Haven, says that the lesson contained 
in Jacob's history is, that no man is by nature so prone to sin 
and evil that there is no hope of his conversion. In early life 
he had all the meaner qualities which vulgar prejudice for a 
long time associated with the name " Jew." He was guilty of 
what, among school boys is the unpardonable offence — he was 
a liar. He was such a man as we horsewhip, deeming him un- 
wortliy of a more dignified chastisement. And yet he became 
an honorable man. Even the calm and self -governed Isaac, 
whose life had no slip or mishap, and whose passions never got 
the mastery over him, had not a more peaceful, pious deathbed 
than Jacob. Of the three Patriarchs who head the HebrcAv 
Church, and who are reverenced throughout Christendom, and 
even among Mahometans, Jacob is not the least. 

His funeral was a remarkable spectacle. Egypt was one 
of the great empires of the East, having an old and ripe civil- 
ization. Its forms of worship, and its funeral ceremonies, were 
elaborate and imposing. Its tombs were pyramids — or moun- 
tains honeycombed with labyrinths. It was a land of sepulchres 
— a thanatopis. The great event of life, was death ; the most 
imposing ceremony, a funeral ; the most costly home, a tomb. 

Joseph was second only to Pharaoh. He was the great 
prophet before whom the priests and magicians bowed in rev- 
erence, and whose supernatural forecast had warded off a fatal 
national calamity. The court and the peo]3le delighted to 
honor him. The death of his father furnished a suitable 023por- 
tunity for an ovation to Joseph, and one in keeping with the 
genius and tastes of that singular nation. 

The body was embalmed, and probably placed in a costly 
sarcophagus to be the prominent object in the solemn pomp of 
the obsequies. All the preparations for burial were according 



38 

to forms 'traditionary with the priests, and when they were com- 
pleted, Egypt make it a national funeral. 

" All the servants and officers of Pharaoh's house," " all the 
Elders of Egypt," all of Jacob's family, except children, and 
in addition, horsemen and chariots, described in the narrative 
" as a great company," attended and united in these ceremonies. 
" The horsemen and chariots " w^ere probably detailed from the 
regular army to secure the safety of this body of men, who 
comprised all of the official functionaries and distinguished 
civilians of Egypt. 

The vast cortege commenced its slow and solemn march 
int€> Palestine. A long procession of venerable men — "all the 
Elders of Egypt " ; the household officers of the king ; the col- 
leges of priests, in robes emblazoned with mystical emblems ; 
the ponderous car and sarcophagus, decorated with funeral in- 
signia ; behind it the Hebrews. Upon the flanks the Egpytian 
army covered the march, and in this manner the great proces- 
sion passed over the border, and took its w^ay into what was a 
foreign, and oftentimes, hostile country. 

A most singular spectacle — that vast concourse of old men ; 
that long column of priests, arrayed in those strange dresses 
covered with riddles of mysterious letters, and figures, and bear- 
ing images of their divinities, and banners displaying hiero- 
glyphic designs. Although an army accompanied it, the sad, 
wailing music announced to the inhabitants that this was no 
hostile invasion. 

At length they arrived at the cemetery of the Patriarchs, 
and there they all remained seven days, performing tlie rites of an 
Egyptian funeral. The inhabitants gathered about this place, 
and gazed with wonder upon these singular strangers and these 
mysterious ceremonies — tllis |)rotracted funeral. The place 
w^as afterward known as Abel Misraim, or the Mourning of the 
Egyptians. At the close of the Egyptian rites, the Hebrews 
deposited the body in the family vault nt Mamre. 

And such was the manner of Jacob's burial. 'No other 
Patriarch had similar honor. His checkered life, so often ob- 
scured by clouds of sin, had a gorgeous sunset. 



SAUL, 

THE KING OP THE HEBREWS. 



About four Imudred years after the deatli of Abraliam, 
the Hebrews invaded Palestine. At some remote period, long 
before that time, the Plujenecians had formed settlements along 
the coast of that conntiy. 

History gives us only tantalizing glimpses of that myste- 
rious people. Tlie}^ conquered by commerce, as Eome after- 
wards did by arms ; and they held the sovereignty of the seas 
until the latter days of the Roman Republic. It was an em- 
pire, such as Bonaparte at Austerlitz, longed to obtain — an em- 
pire founded ujjon " ships, colonies and commerce." 

Along the eastern shores of the Mediterranean they had 
established trading posts, which had grown into cities. In the 
earliest dawn of Greek civilization, and while Rome was a 
primeval forest, Tyre w^as an ancient and renowned city, the 
commercial metropolis of that great inland sea. Its ships trav- 
ersed every ocean, and its merchants traded with the remotest 
regions. It rivaled in wealth and refinement and luxury the 
great cities upon the Euphrates and Nile. 

The origin of this people is a matter of some uncertainty. 
It is commonly believed that they came from the country bor- 
dering upon the Arabian and Indian Seas, and Avere Cushites. 
Civilization began with this branch of the human family. The 
phonetic alphabet, numerals, and most of the arts and sciences, 
originated there. Recent discoveries of archaic writing, ex- 
humed in the lower basin of Mesopotamia, are giving us some 
of the annals, or at least some of the traditions, relating to that 
great empire or race. For many centuries they were the fore- 
most people of their time. Then for nearly four thousand 
years all record of them seemed to be lost. What the 



40 

Eomans failed to find and destroy, perished when Amrou burnt 
the hbraries in Egypt. But tlie clay tablets, buried and for- 
gotten in the plains where the cities of this people formerly 
stood, are giving us fragments of history which seemed to have 
been utterly lost. We may hereafter know more of this pre- 
historic period than we know of Greece or Rome. 

The western section of Palestine belonged to the Phoeni- 
cians. The inhabitants of the interior are termed in the Scrip- 
ture, Philistines. 

Of whatever race they might have been, their near vicinity 
to the Phoenician cities, and their long intercourse with this 
superior civilization, had given them a marked advantage over 
the Hebrews. They had fortified cities, iron war chariots, com- 
plete suits of armor, and the various weapons used in those 
times. Tyre and Sidon supplied them with luxuries brought 
from Babylon and Memphis, and were marts for the sale of 
their products ; the fruit of the fields and flocks, of the forest 
and mines. The country fed the cities, and formed a kind of 
suburb to them ; sharing, in some degree, the opinions, super- 
stitions and intelligence of those cities. 

The inhabitants of the central part of Palestine were a 
martial people. The country was a range of mountams and 
natural strongholds. The struggle to gain it, and to defend it, 
continued with varying fortunes for many centuries. In the 
plains, the chariots prevailed, but in the hills, the athletic 
vigor of the Hebrews gave them the victory. They came of 
a race whose muscles had been hardened in the brickyards of 
Egypt, and who inherited the robust strength gained from 
generations of laborers. This physical power was intensified 
by an eager purpose ; for the Hebrew was fighting for the 
Promised Land. 

Step by step, and battle by battle, they forced themselves 
into the country, till the hostile races had become almost in- 
termingled, and the warfare was like an internicene warfare, 
covering the entire land. There were temporary truces, and 
sudden outbreaks. Sometimes the Hebrews seemed to be sub- 
dued, but they could not be expelled. 



41 

The extreme difference in tlie political and religions insti- 
tutions of these enemies envenomed the strife. The Philistines 
seem to have adopted the form of government which the Phce- 
nicians had introdnced, and they were confederacies of inde- 
pendent cities. They had liereditary orders of nobles and 
princes. Their religion was a pantheism, which the Greeks 
and Romans copied with little more than a change of name. 
They Avere a gay, Inxnrions, spirited race. There is a kind of 
fascination in snch qnalities. Their poetic superstitions, and the 
blandishments of their customs, often j)roved to be more formi- 
dable than arms. Their divinities were only the linnian pas- 
sions personified and exaggerated; some of these are most win- 
ning and seductive. Painting, Sculpture and Poetry have 
exhausted themselves in ideals of such Divinities. 

The Hebrews had none of the arts, or polish, of civiliza- 
tion. They were monotheists. They made no image of God, 
and hesitated to write or speak His name. They had no heredi- 
tary rulers, and no national government. Their laws were 
statutes regulating their personal relations, and prescribing their 
religious observances. Statutes not made by the people, or 
with their assent, but coming down to them as Divine com- 
mands. They W6i*e a church, rather than a state. . Their King 
was God. They fought to gain a country, for they had been 
aliens and bondsmen four hundred years. It was the long 
promised land, and their banner was *' God with us." It was a 
long war, bequeathed from generation to generation. The 
grim, determined Hebrew and the gay and dashing Philis- 
tine encountered each other year after year, and became inter- 
mixed in all Palestine, and never at peace, except for some mere 
truce. 

The forces which came to the aid of Troy were drawn from 
regions contiguous to Palestine. If not Phoenician, they had 
much in common with the PlKjenician communities. It Avas 
about the time of the Hebrew invasion. Homer has given us 
some vivid pictures of these men, and their arms and niode of 
life. He was describing the men whom the Hebrew Scriptures 



describe under the general name of Philistines. The two pic- 
tures are from two standpoints. One is a Hebrew view, the 
other Greek — both enemies. 

History has no other account of such a struggle to con- 
quer any country. Four hundred years of fighting in a little 
strip of land scarcely larger than Yermont. It does not require 
many generations of men, living under such conditions, to de- 
velope the rough and daring qualities which characterize bor- 
der men and bushwhackers. They were without commerce, 
and with few of the arts. They rarely dwelt in cities. They 
subsisted upon their flocks and herds, and upon precarious har- 
vests, gathered in the valleys, and not un frequently abandoned 
to theii- enemies. They had no temples, and they scarcely had 
a form of government. They acknowledged no hereditary 
rulers. Bold and audacious men from time to time became 
leaders, and acted as magistrates. 

It was a state of society but little removed from anarchy. 
Courage and physical qualities secured a following. A leader 
might raise himself into power if he had daring and strength, 
which could capture the popular mind in times of violence and 
danger. The enemy was always near by. Every man took his 
life in his hand, and depended upon force or craft. Raids and 
ambushes, personal encounters and hairbreadth escapes, hap- 
pened constantly, for it was a border war, exasperated by 
hereditary injuries and wrongs. And this had lasted so long 
that it seemed to be the normal condition of society in Pales- 
tine. 

Of the twelve Hebrew tribes, the most remarkable for 
turbulence, waywardness and recklessness, was Benjamin. On 
a notable occasion this small tribe defied the whole eleven. It 
refused to surrender certain ruffians who had fled to it for shel- 
ter. For three days it resisted the whole military force of the 
other tribes with a kind of desperation. When the resistance 
was overcome, the tribe was almost extinguished. A few men 
had escaped into the mountains, and they were the sole sur- 
vivors, for all the women and children had been massacred. 



43 

To 23 re vent the utter extinction of one of the Hebrew 
tribes, permission was given to these Benjaminites to get them- 
selves Avives from tlie Philistines, or Phoenicians. The conrtship 
and wooing were of a very snmmarj and decisive character, 
quite in keeping witli the temper and liabits of these men. 
Thev watclied and waited for an opportunity to make a seizure 
by main force. At lengtli, when one of the semi-rehgious fes- 
tivals of the Philistines had brought together a concourse of 
women, and a band of damsels were having an outdoor dancing 
party, a raid was made upon them, and they were swept away 
somewhat in tlie Poman fashion, when the Romans captured 
the Sabine virgins. From such an ancestry came the restored 
tribe of Benjamin, and of this lineage was the first Hebrew 
king. 

Saul was a rej^resentative man — not merely of the He- 
brews, but of his particular Sept or tribe. When selected by 
Samuel, he was a young man, probably the youngest of his 
family. The narrative gives us nothing of his history up to the 
time when he went forth to search for his father's asses — it 
merely says, "He was a choice young man." It indirectly 
gives an insight to his family relations. He was an affectionate 
son, for he feared that his prolonged absence would give anxiety 
at home. He thought that property was not valuable enough 
to be purcliased at such a price. A robust boy, full of animal 
spirits, and a leader in all youthful sports and adventures, he 
cherished a tender regard for the feelings of his father, and 
gave him a willing and dutiful obedience. 

His mode of life till middle age is matter of inference. 
He was a herdsman ; a man of gigantic stature and intr^epid 
courage. Life in the hills was full of danger. The lion made 
night raids upon his charge, and by day the Amalekite and 
Philistines hovered about him. It was a time of raids, incur- 
sions and personal encounters ; an endless border warfare. The 
region was full of insecurity, sudden peril and deadly strife. 
He was reared under such conditions, and he was peculiarly 
rpialified for them. He was a daring man, of imposing presence 



44 

and great athletic power ; a natural leader and king of a rude! 
and warlike peo]3le. 

Dynasties nsually begin with such men. The origin and 
foundation of authority is force ; and some successful military 
commander becomes a monarch. For a long period, in the 
liistory of the world, titles have dated back to some conquest, 
and the charter deed was a battlefield. Warci'aft wins, and 
statecraft keej^s. The old families in Europe liold by such 
title. 

Saul was a Hebrew, of a peculiar strain. He was a true 
son of the wayward, reckless house of Benjamin — a man of 
singular idiosyncrasy — fearless, moody, di-eamy ; capable of the 
highest efforts, and subject to great mental depression. There 
was a tinge of insanity in his nature. He had the strong pas- 
sions which belong to a perfect animal organization ; and he 
was utterly fearless. But he was not cruel, and he never shed 
blood in mere wantonness. 

He shrank from the stern command to exterminate every 
living creature belonging to a conquered enemy, and this act 
of disobedience cost him his kingdom. 

The history of his reign is given in a series of detached 
and sketchy incidents. The book of Samuel and the Illiad may 
be read together, for they are merely cotemporaneous accounts 
of men and customs, and the state of society along the eastern 
shores of the Mediterranean and Egean. Tliey deal with nearly 
the same things— describe battles, personal combats by cham- 
pions in front of armies, vows and sacrifices offered and oracles 
invoked for supernatural aid. Both are word paintings of 
events closely connected in time and place, and having much 
in common. Saul, Jonathan and David stand before us more 
distinctly than the persons who fought under the walls of Troy. 
There is more poetry and romance in the simple prose of tlie 
Hebrew narrative than in the Greek poem. Hector, Eneas 
and Achilles are dubious, lialf imaginary persons — myths and 
shadows. The faces in the Old Testament gallery seem to be 
photographs; fancy had nothing to do with them. Actual 



45 

men sat for tliese portraits ; and tlie story of their lives is more 
remarkable that any tales of fiction. They inclncle the great- 
est extremes of Imman condition, and give ns the Avhole spec- 
trum of human passions. 

Saul was a young man, and in the service of his father, 
when he received from Samuel a commission to become the 
King of the Hebrews. The communication was made in pri- 
vate, and Saul seeniKS to have concealed it from his family, and 
from the 23ublic. He continued his accustomed employments, 
and spent his time in the hills with his herds. He made no 
effort to attract attention, or to secure this extraordinary prize. 

We liave no means of knowing how many years passed 
while he remained in this obscure position, or what thoughts 
and plans occupied the mind of this man in his solitary em- 
ployment. At length an event haj^pened which changed his 
after life. The Plujenicians or Philistines made one of their 
raids in his neighborhood, and he came to the front. He as- 
sembled a force, took command, and gave battle. The gigantic 
herdsman seemed to his people to be their natural leader, and 
they followed him, not knowing that he had a divine commis- 
sion. They liad probably long known him as one of the most 
pow^erful and intrepid of the hill men. It was the beginning 
of his reign. Saul was king de facto at the close of that 
battle. 

He fought many battles "during his long and stormy career. 
In tliese battles he encountered men like those who were fight- 
ing at that time about Troy. His western enemy was the Phoe- 
nician, who put into the field all the machinery of war known 
to their time. Their battle array was an imposing spectacle. 
They covered the plains with long fronts of iron chariots. 
Clouds of cavalry hovered about, watching their opiDortiinity. 
Deep masses of spearmen were drawn up, and stood like a 
forest of iron. The ranks blazed with armor, as if the great 
mass was in fiames. All was moved as if it was one body. 
A single will governed this great human machine, invented for 
conquest, a disciplined army. 



46 

Saul liad become established as king, and his reign was a 
kind of military anthority. His spear was ahvays at head, and 
seemed a very appropriate sceptre. He had gathered about him 
a standing army of veterans. The administration of civil affairs 
seems to have occupied but little of his attention. He was the 
commander of his army, and his i eigu was a long series of w^ars 
with the hereditary enemies of his people. The Hebrews had 
accepted him as king. He was at the head of his nation. 

Saul paid the penalty usually exacted for such elevation. 
He exchanged the careless freedom of a life in the hills for 
anxiety, distrust, and perplexity. He w^as harassed by suspi- 
cions which fretted him, because they had no tangible shape. 
They were enemies with whom he could not grapple as he had 
been used to do with the lion or the Philistine. He was 
chafed by invisible restraints, which his natural daring and 
recklessness made more unbearable. Saul was king, but he 
felt that he had a master. 

He was watched by a stern old man, who seems to have 
regarded him as a pupil or subordinate. Samuel had the pecu- 
liar qualities which have usually characterized the union of 
civil with ecclesiastical authority. He had been a priest all his 
life, and for a long period was an actual sovereign, exercising 
all the functions of a supreme ruler in a theocratic government. 
He made stated circuits ^through the country and held his 
courts as a magistrate. His visits seem to have impressed the 
people with awe and dread. He was. an old man, and for a long 
time he had been King and Po23e. He was cojnpelled by the 
23eople to give them a king, and he seems to have intended that 
Saul shoidd have no actual authority. Samuel retained control of 
affairs, and he watched Saul with ceaseless vigilance. Har- 
assed by outside enemies, and threatened by Samuel with the 
loss of his kingdom, Saul brooded moodily over his affairs. He 
had the reckless courage of his ancestors, and with it a vein of 
madness, which the narrative describes as " an evil spirit sent 
from the Lord." But in his deepest gloom he never attempted 
to stupify thought by coarse aniuial indulgences. He had 



4:1- 

recourse to the most refined of all anodynes, the most spiritual of 
sensual pleasures. He sought relief in music — the nepenthe of 
a poet. He was swayed bj contradictory impulses, thwarted, 
disappointed, perplexed. In his reveries the future seemed to 
darken over him with the coming tempest. 

It is a singular circumstance that the young minstrel who 
came to soothe the distempered mind of Saul was to become 
the object of an intense dread, and the central figure in a gronp 
of calamities. David does not appear to have been noticed by 
Saul while ministering to him as a musician. When after- 
wards he presented himself to be armed, Saul did not recognize 
him as his former attendant. When he came before him with 
the s23oils of the slain Philistine, Saul asked others to tell him 
something of this youth, whose name in their language was 
" The Darling." It was a very natural curiosity. A lithe and 
graceful form in the simple dress of a shepherd boy ; a face 
radiant with poetic beauty came and asked permission to accept 
a challenge which had intimidated the whole army. 

Tiie return of David from that combat, and his interview 
with Saul, are presented with great descriptive force. The 
whole scene is brought before us like a picture. The army 
officers, dark, stalwart men, standing in the background, and 
forming a half -circle behind Saul ; David, with glowing face ; — 
a young Apollo, radiant with enthusiasm and chivalry ; Jona- 
than and his sisters gazing at this country boy and giving their 
sonls to him ; in the midst, the toweriug and gigantic Saul 
looking upon this stripling with strange and dubious emotions 
which he cannot analyse or understand. 

From this time the lives of Saul and David become inter- 
woven together. David is a member of Saul's family ; almost 
adored by SauFs son and daugliter ; the darling of the people ; 
one of the military commanders ; the theme of songs and bal- 
lads ; the Giant Killer. Saul observes with keen interest the 
relations of this young man to Jonathan, and how he seems to 
win all hearts to himself. Jonathan, the heir to tlie thi'one, 
treats David as his natural sovereign. 



48 

On a certain occasion Saul sat at meat amidst Lis family, 
and as usual liis spear was witliin reach. David was a member 
of this circle, and was in his place. The yonng j^eople were 
probably occupied with what interested them, and chatted with 
each other. Sanl silently observed them, and while he gazed 
at David pondered over a gloomy, threatening future. He 
loved and liated David, for he liad been warned by Samuel 
that the kingdom would be taken from him. This inmate of 
liis family — this husband of his daughter — was to wrest the 
sceptre from him. Even liis very children would aid this usurp- 
er. Starting from such a reverie, and maddened by it, Saul 
more than once hurled his spear in an exstacy of frenzy against 
David, and sought to kill him. Every such paroxysm ended 
in sharp remorse. 

It became impossible for David to come into the presence 
of Saul, and he became a fugitive. Saul hunted for him, and 
had no peace. His stormy life was occupied in endless war ; 
but of all his foes, the one most dreaded was this wandering 
outlaw, who had no following but a band of needy and desper- 
ate men; and who constantly eluded all efforts to capture him. 
And yet Saul loved David. In one of his fiercest hunts to 
destroy him there is this strange outburst .of feeling ; and we see 
how Saul was tormented and maddened by contending motives. 
There is a touching pathos in some of the incidents. In his 
last and most determined effort to destroy David, he is roused 
from sleep by the sound of a familiar voice, and his whole soul 
seems to melt. " Is it thy voice, my son David ?" " To be wroth 
with one we love doth work like madness in the brain.'' Saul 
had such madness, and his history is full of strange and contra- 
dictory conduct. He was the head of the Hebrews, and he was 
probably the most unhappy man in Palestine. 

The faults of Saul were carefully observed by Samuel. 
He had opposed the popular movement for a king, and seemed 
not unwilling to have the people see that they had gained noth- 
ing by a change of rulers. This grim, austere old man was the 
only one before whom the daring and reckless sjDirit of Saul 



^ 49 

quailed. From the time when this priest uiiwiningly proclaimed 
Saul king, till the dread hour when he rose from his grave to 
tell him of his doom, there was no moment when Saul felt at 
ease in his presence. He more than once humbled himself and 
sought to placate and win him. The proud, impulsive, and 
intrepid king grovelled at the feet of this stern, cold judge, and 
clung to his mantle, supplicating forgiveness and aid. Samuel 
spurned him, and at length refused even to see him. 

In the midsts of these discords and contentions no cloud 
came between David and Jonathan. Their relations to each 
other remained unchanged, and were of the most romantic 
character. At their first interview the king's son gave himself 
to the shepherd boy as a life friend. 

The narrative is picturesque in its homeliness and sim- 
plicity : " Jonathan made David a covenant, because he loved 
him as his own soul, and he stripped himself of the robe that was 
upon him and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his 
sword, and to his bow and girdle." 

This was when David presented himself before the court 
of Saul after the duel with Goliah — a country boy, with no 
weapon but a shepherd's sling. If Jonathan was fascinated, we 
can imagine the effect upon his sister, for she was one of this 
group. 

Jonathan was a knight, gentle and true, without fear or 
reproach, and faithful to his covenant. His devotion was most 
unselfish, for Saul's efforts were in the interest of the family. 
Jonathan strove to frustrate them, even at the peril of his life. 
When David had been hunted out of the country, Jonathan 
followed Saul to his last battle and died with him. There is 
something exquisite and almost ideal in his character — a j)ure, 
gentle, fearless man, tender, confiding, and true as a woman. 
David could never replace this friend, and he never forgot him. 
He enshrined his memory in a monody, which is the most pa- 
thetic thing in those old records. 

The story of Saul's last battle is vague and fragmentary, 
but enough is told to enable one to give a probable description 



60 

of it— to pass tlie scene before as a spectacle — one of the 
great battles of ancient times. 

Palestine is a mountainous region, separating the Mediter- 
ranean from the countries in the valley of the Mesopotamia. 
At a certain point between Gallilee and Samaria there is an old 
passway leading through these highlands. From time im- 
memorial this has been the route of commerce and of armies. 
"When wars have occurred between the empires in the plains of 
the Euphrates and their rivals on the eastern shores of the 
Mediterranean J or in Egypt, this was the route always taken, 
and here they most frequently encountered each other. 

This passage is in a triangular plain, with irregular sides, 
fifteen or eighteen miles long. It has its western apex where 
the little river Gishon descends into tlie Lowland, which is the 
equivalent name for Canaan ; the ancient designation of the 
flatlands bordering that part of the Mediterranean. 

This great opening through the mountains is the famous 
Esdraelon. It has been a battlefield for a period extending 
beyond history. Cushite, Turanian and Semitic armies, whose 
very names are lost, have trampled that plain. Chaldea, Assy- 
ria, Egypt, Rome, the Saracens, and the Crusaders, have ar- 
rayed their hosts upon Esdraelon, aud left their bodies to 
enrich it. 

A luxuriant vegetation makes it a striking contrast to the 
barren heights which overlook it. Its verdure has been fed by 
more than four thousand years of human slaughter. One might 
almost fancy that the brilliant flowers which enliven it were 
memorials planted by the kindly hand of nature in memory of 
nameless and long forgotten men. Those ancient armies still 
remain there ; its soil is dead men. 

John, in the Apocalypse, calls it Armagedon, and makes 
it the final battlefield of the assembled human race and of all 
the powers of darkness. In that broken country this plain was 
the only place where war chariots and cavalry could operate, 
and its great extent was ample for the evolutions of the largest 
armies. 



51 

There Saul fonglit liis last battle. The Phoenicians or 
Philistines had found him an active and formidable enemy. It 
is probable that on this occasion they assembled their whole 
mihtary force, and intended to terminate the long war by a 
decisive victory. Gathering their armies together from the 
cities on the coast, they j^robably came wp by the Gishon and 
debouched into the great plain. In the language of the narra- 
tive, " The Lords of the Philistines passed by in bands of hun- 
dreds and thousands." The long column marched into the 
plain, and across it, to its eastern extremity, where it came to 
a halt and arrayed itself in order for battle — chariots in the 
centre, flanked by spearmen, archers and cavalry. Banners 
and ensigns were displayed, and the air vibrated with a mar- 
tial music of which we have no record — -the national songs and 
war tunes of the Phoenicians. This imposing front extended 
along the j^lains facing to the south, and it seemed a line of Are. 
Helmets of polished brass, bright shields and glittering armor 
flashed back the fierce light of a Syrian sun. It was one of 
the many military displays which the grey old mountains have 
so often seen exhibited in that famous amphitheatre. 

Saul had assembled his forces upon the opposite side of 
the plain and upon the declivities of Gilboa. He could look 
over the Phoenecian front upon the vast, deep mass behind it, 
and take in at a glance the arrangement and strength of the 
mighty host. Tlie armies stood regarding each other in grim 
silence — neither willing to make the attack, and thus the day 
ended. 

At midnight Saul passed stealthily through his lines in 
disguise, and after a hazardous w^lk of seven or eight miles, 
came to Endor and clambered up the rocks to the cavern of a 
woman known to the times as the Witch of Endor. He had 
in vain attempted by the Hebrew rites to obtain some intima- 
tion of what was to happen, and he undertook this perilous 
niglit journey to visit an outlawed hag, and invoke the aid 
of demons. He required the woman to summon before him 
the disembodied spirit of Samuel. Such a demand was the 



52 

very ecstasy of desperation. Samuel had been a propliet of 
disaster to him all liis life, and Saul must have known that such 
a messenger would bring him from the other world no mes- 
sage of comfort. 

The incantation raised before him a shape which did not 
wait to be questioned ; but introduced itself with the abrupt 
and stern demand, " Why hast thou disquieted me, to bring me 
up ?" Saul bowed his face, and said, " I am sore distressed. 
The Philistines make war against me, and God has departed 
from me and answereth me no more, neither by prophets nor 
by dreams, therefore I have called thee that thou may est make 
known to me what I shall do." It was the ghastly confession 
of a woebegone and desperate man — a prayer offered to the 
adversaries of his God and to the Divinities of his enemies. He 
had overthrow^n their altars, slain their w^orshipers, denounced 
their rites as profanities, and now, in his extremity, he appealed 
to these dark and formidable beings for aid and counsel. He 
had not long to wait for an answer, and it came like a flash of 
lightning in a night storm, opening before him a lurid future, 
and blinding him with horror : " To-morrow shalt thou and thy 
sons be with me, a,nd the Lord shall also deliver the host of Israel 
into the hands of the Philistines " — with this tremendous maledic- 
tion the spectre vanished, and Saul fell insensible upon the earth. 

There are many instances on record of supernatural warn- 
ing which men have received of an impending disaster; but 
neither sacred nor profane history tells of anything so grim and 
fearful as that midnight scene in the cave of Endor. 

In the morning, Saul stood at the head of his army and 
surveyed it with a calm, stern face, which gave no indications 
of his midnight adventures. He was sheathed in armor, but 
his helmet w^as a golden crown, and upon his naked right arm 
he wore a golden bracelet. His gigantic form was conspicuous 
over the wdiole field. He knew that he w^as a doomed man, 
and he arrayed himself in the insignia of his rank that his ene- 
mies might distinguish him. It was a challenge and defiance. 
'No more majestic figure ever stood before an army. 



53 

For a brief time the two hosts confronted each other in 
ominous silence. Saul raised his hand, and the Hebrew trumpet 
gave the signal for battle. Chariots and horsemen rushed for- 
ward, and the hosts met with a shock like an earthquake. It 
was the indescribable tumult of great multitudes fighting hand 
to hand with the ferocity of personal struggles. Saul seemed 
to dare and defy his fate, and he imparted to his army his un- 
daunted spirit. It was a fatal battle for the Phoenicians — their 
victory crippled them, and they were soon after subdued by 
David. 

Saul knew that he must die upon that field, and he sought 
death with reckless desperation. 

During all the long and fierce struggle his towering form, 
with golden crown and naked right arm, reeking with carnage, 
was a central figure in a storm of arrows which rained about 
him. He rushed upon a forest of spears, dealing death and 
seeking the friendly stroke which would save him from wit- 
nessing the defeat of his army. 

But there was to be no remission for him. He was to see 
the full execution of his sentence, and consummate it with his 
own death. It was a lost battle, and his army was forced back 
into the mountains. He stood at bay, covered with wounds. 
He could overlook the plain strewn with the dead. His sons lay 
before him slain. His empire had gone to wreck. He w^as a 
ruined man, and the Phoenicians followed hard after him. This 
was the doom denounced to him in the cave of Endor. Noth- 
ing remained to complete it but his own death. He had vainly 
sought death from the hand of his enemies, and the boon had 
been denied him. Saul slew himself. 

Hannibal fied from Cartilage and Bonaparte from Waterloo ; 
if, like Saul, they had disdained mere self-preservation, and re- 
fused to survive the catastrophe which ruined them, would the 
judgment of mankind have been less indulgent ? Saul slew 
himself, and so did Cato and Brutus. Public opinion among 
the old Romans sanctioned such an act. Bajazette, in his iron 



64 

cage, might envy the fate of Sardanapalus seated upon his fune- 
ral pjre. Zenobia, swelling the triumph of Aurelian, was less 
fortunate than Cleopatra, The heathen did not deem death the 
greatest of misfortunes. It requires a higher and purer cour- 
age than any heathen theology or philosophy can give, to ena- 
ble one to stand firmly and patiently in every extremity of suf- 
fering or disaster, and wait for the relief which Grod will send 
in his own time, and by his own messenger — Death. 

The Old Testament presents a gallery of jDortraits, strong, 
sharp likenesses of some of the prominent men and women of 
those remote times. None of these pictures are more striking 
and lifelike tli^n that of Saul ; a proud, sad face, shadowed with 
the peculiar expression which a great but unforeseen calamity 
cast before it — such a countenance as we might fancy for one 
destined to meet some strange and terrible disaster. 

It sometimes happens, when strolling among pictures, that 
the attention is caught by a particular face. It has a singular 
expression wdiich excites curiosity. The catalogue gives no 
information ; merely says " A Head by an Old Master." But 
who was the original ? for this must be a portrait, and of a re- 
markable man — some one who had authority and an extraor- 
dinary career. The face is proud and gloomy, and the eyes seem 
to look at something not seen, as if the mind was sad and 
abstracted. A kind of mist gives it an indistinctness. Job des- 
cribes this strange darkening when he says, "On my eyelids 
rests the Shadow of Death." 

It is an old and dini picture, and its colors have almost 
faded into a common tint, but the face itself fascinates you. 
If told afterwards that this was the head of Saul, by Mu- 
rillo, you would understand the secret of its spell. It was his 
ideal of such a man. The e"xpression which he had given to 
it, and which seemed to flicker over it with that vague and 
strange changefuhiess, was his mode of indicating the mental 
distemper — the tinge of lunacy. 

Saul was a Hebrew, and it was a peculiar people. Their 



55 

history is remarkable ; tliey were, and tliey remain, an enigma. 
The records of this people while in Palestine are fnll of the 
strangest exhibitions of inconsistent and contradictory opinions 
and condnct. They were obstinate and fickle, stnbborn and 
wayward ; monotheists, lapsing constantly into polytheism ; 
swaying back and.forth between the worship of Baal, Ashtaroth 
and Jehovah ; having fits of panic, and periods of the most dar- 
ing intrepidity ; waging a w^ar of extermination, and in the in- 
tervals of trnce intermarrying and intermingling with their 
hereditary enemies ; impatient of all government ; tnrbnlent, 
mutinous and discontented — their character was a compound 
of perplexing contradictions. 

Saul was a representative man, fit for his times and his 
people. His faults were, in a large degree, characteristic of this 
race. He embodied the strange contradictions of the Hebrew 
nature — impulsive, heroic, jealous, moody, and impatient of 
control. 

But he was no common man, and not an utterly bad man. 
His relations with David and Samuel throw light upon' one side 
of his twofold nature. Tliere must have been something noble 
and lovable about him, for even Samuel mourned for him after 
he had refused to visit him, and David, under all his provoca- 
tions, continued to reverence him, and pronounced over him 
one of the most touching elegies. 

Jonathan clung to him in his hour of greatest peril, and 
died before him. He won the complete devotion of his people, 
and they followed him wherever he would lead them. Such a 
man must have had a better side to his nature. He could at- 
tract and win love. 

It is hardly probable that all the personal narratives which 
are found in the Bible were put there merely to preserve to all 
ages a record of such events. They are something more than 
little sketches describing what the words naturally imply. There 
is an inner meaning to them. These fragments of biograj)hy 
are hieroglyphic writing, symbols enunciating lessons of univer- 



56 

sal interest. The inner sense, tlie second meaning, lies below 
the surface which is only a token of it. 

It is this inner sonl of the story with which we have to 
do, and the history of Saul was given for a purpose. It has a 
deep signification. It is a profound sermon. 

He was a man of impulse and emotion. Such a man as 
poets and romance writers delight to honor. His life was a 
romance, full of vicissitudes and adventures, which dazzle and 
captivate the common mind. He was of heroic mould, such as 
the Greeks made into demigods. He was a splendid physical 
man. He obtained tlie pre-eminence among his people. He was 
full of human nature, witli all of its strange contradictions, for 
even what we call genius, is only a condition of splendid im- 
perfections, of intellectual distortion, glittering weaknesses.' 

But Saul had no settled and firm convictions. He lacked 
the symmetrical beauty of character so rarely found and so in- 
appropriately named, " common sense." " The evil spirit from 
the Lord," which was sent to distract him, was his own way- 
ward and passionate temper. He could not govern himself. 
His conduct had no anchorage upon steadfast principle. With 
all of his distinguished advantages, he was an unhappy man, and 
the manner of his death was in keeping with his life — the clos- 
ing scene of a tragedy. His best epitaph would be the single 

word MiSERIMUS. 



MEMOIR 



The following- Memoir of HOMER H. STUART is reprinted 
with permission of B. F. Severance, Esq., author of "Genealogy of 
Londonderry Stewarts, Greenfield, Mass., 1905". In that work it 
was incorporated in a sketch of Mr. Stuart's parents and grand- 
parents and it is separated therefrom in what follows and is more 
in detail than was permissible in the Genealogy. 



Homer H. Stuart's given names were derived as follows: 
Homer Hine, the son of Noble Hine and Patience Hubbell, was born 
.July 25, 1776, and died at Youngstown, Ohio, in 1856. He was a 
cousin of Aaron Stewart. Aaron Stewart in compliment to this 
cousin named his elder son Homer Hine Stewart. It will be ob- 
served that the surname is spelled in two ways. The subject of 
this Memoir after attaining his majority reverted to "S-t-u-a-r-f, 
as written by the earlier generations of his family. In this form 
it appeared in the Will of his ancestor, John Stuart, who was born 
in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1682, and died in Londonderry, N. H., 
April 3rd, 1741. 

Homer Hine Stuart was born April 1, 1810, in New Haven, Vt. 
He remarked that the only recollection he held of his father (Aaron 
Stewart) was sitting on the knee of a tall man and playing with 
the large buttons on his army coat. Once he recalled this incident 
to his mother and she responded that his father was then bidding 
her good-bye ere departing to the War of 1812, where he laid down 
his life. Referring to a letter, dated New Haven, Vt., we may lo- 
cate the episode as having happened about March 11, 1813. In the 
latter part of this year, Aaron's widow, Mrs. Selinda Stewart, went 
to Fayston, Vt., and resided with her father, John Colt, who was 
born in Lyme, Connecticut, and who after the War of the Revolu- 
tion removed to Vermont. 

Homer's early childhood was passed in Fayston and the spot 
always remained distinct in his recollection. It was a township 
lying amid a tangle of domes and peaks, near Camel's Hump at 
the head waters of Mad River, which flows northward into the 
Winooski. It was a region of surpassing beauty. Bears and 
wolves lurked within the forest lying above the clearings made 
by its farmers. Except in winter these animals seldom gave trou- 
ble. He related that one cold moonlit night the household was 
aroused by squeals from the pigpen. Before his grandfather Colt 
could get out of doors with his musket, a bear was seen silhouetted 



58 

against the snowy hillside dragging a lusty porker. Another time 
Homer was sitting on a fallen tree picking raspberries and looked 
up to see a great black bear at the other end of the tree likewise 
picking raspberries! In the brook beside the house he amused 
himself making dams and placing upon them water wheels whittled 
out for him by his uncle, Charles Bulkeley Colt. Water from this 
brook was conducted to the kitchen where it flowed through a huge 
tree trunk hollowed into a trough holding captive a lot of trout. 
It was customary to scoop a batch of these fish, when a guest hap- 
pened along unexpectedly, and serve them fried with pieces of 
salt pork. Next day Homer would be sent out with pole and line 
and pail to capture another supply to place in the trough and this 
attractive task was readily performed; for trout in those days fairly 
longed to take a hook. In a log school-house he learned his letters 
and he remarked that "1818" was the first date he remembered 
writing on his slate. From descriptions which have come down 
from his mother, he was then a sturdy freckled brown-eyed little 
boy with tow hair, "homely", as she phrased it. He grew, however, 
strikingly handsome. Indeed during his later years his appearance 
was the subject of remark wherever he went. He himself, how- 
ever, had not a trace of vanity. 

When the statue of the "Typical Puritan" was being designed 
in 1881, Augustus St. Gaudens, the sculptor, was desirous he should 
pose. Not knowing Mr. Stuart personally, he sought out Roswell 
Smith, the founder of the Century Magazine and asked his good 
offices in the matter of inducing Mr, Stuart to pose. When Mr, 
Smith broached the proposition of St. Gaudens, Mr. Stuart, taken 
by surprise, colored like a child. It is to be regretted exceedingly 
that his modesty caused him to deny, not only this, but similar 
requests of many other artists, and we have merely a reproduction 
of a photograph which fails entirely in portraying the complexion, 
fresh as the blossom of a hawthorn, the kindly brown eyes and 
the beautiful silvery hair. 

John Stewart decided in 1819 that his grandson Homer should 
have a liberal education and summoned him to Middlebury to at- 
tend school. Here he passed the next few years. In 1828 he en- 
tered Middlebury College, teaching schools at intervals near Ticon- 
deroga and Lake George and Warren, Vt, He ranked high in his 
class and his graduation address in 1832 was very creditable. He 
studied law at Windsor, Vt., where a few years later his acquaint- 
ance with William M. Evarts began. During a portion of this pe- 
riod he taught a school at Springfield, Vt., for from the time of 
graduation at Middlebury College, he was dependent upon his own 
efforts. These early years were toilsome and marked by self-denial 



59 

and bred in him the habits of thoroughness which characterized 
his after life. Finally he started for New York, via Troy, En 
route he saw a railroad for the first time and enjoyed the novelty 
of a ride in one of the stage coach bodies which had been mounted 
on car wheels and attached to the primitive "Low-commotive En- 
gine", as one of his New England contemporaries pronounced the 
word in the dawn of American Railroading. The line then extend- 
ed from Albany to Schenectady and can be considered as one of 
the pioneer railroads. 

He made his home for awhile at 57 John Street with David 
Hale, a friend of his Uncle Ira Stewart. Afterwards he roomed 
at 41 Liberty Street with Egbert Starr and Henry Warren, two men 
of his age, from Vermont. 

His stay in New York lasted some time, and in his leisure 
hours he rambled about the city which was to claim so much of his 
life. He found the houses rather scattering north of Houston 
Street. Washington Square was a field surrounded by a picket 
fence. Beyond the "Parade Ground", as the Square w^s termed, 
came ordinary farming country. His evening hours were apt to 
be passed on the Battery, for he had a fine ear for music and loved 
to hear the melodies floating from "Castle Garden" out over the 
water. In those days the "Elysian Fields" at Hoboken, where he 
was wont to stroll deserved the name and were not, as now, merged 
in steamship yards. There was also the "Pavilion" on Staten 
Island where he used to sit and review the procession of vessels 
as they passed. 

While in New York an oppiortunity to teach school in Rich- 
mond, Va., presented itself and he accepted. The journey south- 
ward carried him through Philadelphia and Baltimore. The Balti- 
more and Ohio railroad was being extended toward Point of Rocks 
on the Potomac River and he rode in the cars to Relay House 
Station. 

The allusion to this railroad warrants a few remarks concern- 
ing its appearance at this early period. The Baltimore and Ohio 
embodied at the date of inception in 1827 the boldest effort in rail- 
road construction. Even when completed by its far-seeing projec- 
tors. Fridge, Brown and Steuart, to the Ohio River in 1853 it was 
still the longest continuity of rails operated under one charter in 
this or in any other country. Yet, when Mr. Stuart first rode upon 
it in 1833, the larger part of its motive power was supplied by the 
horse. 

Two methods were utilized in applying horse power. By the 
first method, the horses moved on a horse path and pulled a cable 
attached to the forward car. This was "canalling". 



60 

The second method was different. Here the horse was sta- 
tioned upon the forward car of the "brigade" as trains were then 
termed, and stood upon a wide belt passing over a drum. The 
drum was geared to the axle of the wheels and, when the horse 
moved, the motion was communicated in accelerated degree to the 
wheels. When the "engineer" (if the driver can be so termed) re- 
ceived the signal to start he drew forward the brake handle (just 
as the engineer draws out the throttle of the locomotive) and Dob- 
bin feeling the tread-mill slipping, began stepping onward, thus 
propelling the train of coach-like bodies. A surprising pageant 
indeed, one of these "brigades" filled with farmers and their wives, 
and the medley composing the passenger list, gliding apace along 
rails laid on granite sleepers while tantaras from the "engineer's 
horn evoked echoes on those pleasant fields of Maryland. 

Three steam locomotives only were then in service. They 
were named "York", "Atlantic" and "Franklin" and the empirical 
arrangement of their construction was due to theories soon to be 
discarded. Their boilers were upright and likewise their cylinders. 
Their piston rods alternately pushed up and pulled down walking 
beams connected with the diminutive driving wheels and the action 
of these walking beams reminded beholders of the kicking motion 
of a grasshopper's hind legs. From this appearance they derived 
their name "Grasshopper Locomotives". 

How little Mr. Stuart, while riding the first time on the B. & O. 
realized that long, long afterward he would meet and come to 
know the man who had demonstrated in 1829 that this railroad 
could and must be operated by the "Steam Horse". That man was 
the noble Peter Cooper and his successful demonstration was made 
by the tiny locomotive which he himself constructed and ran from 
Baltimore through Relay to Ellicott's Mills. 

Once in after years when the train flashed by Relay, Mr. 
Stuart pointed it out to his son who was making his initial visit 
to Washington, and alluded to those beginnings of the Baltimore 
and Ohio Railroad. Ah! the years were rolled away! He recalled 
the place as revealed when the "brigade" emerged from the deep 
cutting that morn, years before this later time, and in the distance 
the station was in view. In fancy came the mellow cadence of the 
"engineer's" horn, postilion like, warning all concerned to make 
ready for transition. There was Relay once again! But fallen 
from its erstwhile estate of importance into the desuetude fore- 
doomed to every work of man. Gone that ample platform thronged 
with travellers! Gone those granite sleepers! The Stone Age in 
Railroading! Gone the curious iron rails — archaic vehicles and 
motive power, manners, methods, one and all tentative — having 



61 

served the day and generation! Ever "the old order changeth and 
yieldeth place to new!" 

From Relay the stage coach conveyed him toward Washington, 
past that bloody field of Bladensburg. There, just outside the lim- 
its of the District of Columbia, was fought one of the battles of the 
Second War with England, and the capture of our National Capital 
by the British army ensued. But aside from this event the spot 
deserves the title "bloody", for upon this Gretna Green many "af- 
fairs of honor" had taken place conducted under the etiquette of 
the Code Duello. Hither came the duellists from Washington. 
Here the intrepid Decatur, scarce a dozen years earlier, had gone 
down before the aim of Barron and an untimely end had marked 
the career of the author of the sentiment — 

"Our Country! Always right! 
But right or wrong, our Country!" 

Other combats on this field of Bladensburg recurred to him 
as the stage coach progressed toward the Southland and set him 
to musing on the condition of society, which made the declination 
of a challenge an exercise of higher moral courage than the ac- 
ceptance. Thus it was with Decatur who disapproved of the Code 
and yet ever yielded to its demands, fearing public opinion would 
regard his known bravery as having weakened with advancing 
years. The sentiments expressed, in the correspondence of these 
duellists are so mawkish that we wonder how men of sincerity 
could have entertained them. Whatever glamour may have once 
invested the duel, disappeared forever when an Illinois jury con- 
victed the successful duellist of murder in the first degree and the 
sheriff hanged him. 

As Mr. Stuart rode through the National Capital, little was he 
aware that he would be there three decades later during intensely 
stirring times! The Washington spread before him in the 30's 
was an unattractive village, straggling around a few great public 
edifices, the strongest possible contrast to the Washington he 
visited in 1883 for the last time, and for which he held the greatest 
admiration. 

The Richmond school proved uncongenial and the scholars 
turbulent — during the very first week one of the school boys stab- 
bed a fellow scholar! At the house on Shockoe Hill, where Mr. 
Stuart boarded, the fare was "hog and hominy and hoe cake". 
Richmond itself, however, impressed him. It was "half city and 
half country", beautifully situated, and though containing only 
twelve thousand inhabitants, extended widely. He considered the 
State House a majestic building despite its plainness. He noted 



62 

in its atrium a statue of George Washington so unlike the models 
with which he was familiar that it did not please him. On the 
pedestal was inscribed, "Fait par Goudon citoyen Francais, 1798", 
In this inscription he saw the hand of Jefferson who was, he re- 
marked, "three-quarters French and one-quarter American". 

Relinquishing Richmond he took passage on the schooner 
"Wasp", S. H. Worth, Captain, for New York. The craft moved 
leisurely down the James River from "The Rocketts" anchoring at 
intervals and giving opportunity to study the plantations of "Tide- 
water Virginia". "Swallow Barn" so delightfully portrayed in 1833 
by John P. Kennedy, and "The Old Plantation" located on the 
Lower Chesapeake Shore of Maryland, described in James Hunger- 
ford's narrative, dated in 1832, were counterparts of those which 
Mr. Stuart observed from the deck of the schooner. For a better 
view he climbed the mast-head of the "Wasp" as it glided past the 
one house and half-dozen tall ghost-like chimneys which constituted 
the sole relics of Jamestown, and the desolate appearance of this 
historic spot left a mournful recollection. He held in pleasant 
memory an anchorage at Hampton Roads where he and Captain 
Worth put out in an open boat for a day's duck shooting. This 
reconnaissance of the James River and Chesapeake Bay was of 
avail to him thirty years later when tracing on the map the en- 
gagement between the "Monitor" and "Merrimack" and the march- 
ing and countermarching of the two armies in the War of the Rebel- 
lion for the shores of the James and of the Chesapeake were dis- 
tinctly recalled. 

At last weathering Cape Henry the "Wasp" turned her prow 
for Sandy Hook and after a voyage that was very stormy, glided 
into New York Harbor. 

He filled a place as clerk with Rogers, Ketchum & Grosvenor, 
60 Wall Street. It was a firm in an extensive way of business prin- 
cipally in cotton factorage and one of its adjuncts was a forge shop 
or foundry at Paterson, N. J., where in a short time Rogers, 
Ketchum & Grosvenor were to commence the manufacture of loco- 
motives. As late as 1878 one of these old locomotives was pointed 
out by Mr. Stuart at the Grand Central Station and he called atten- 
tion to the brass letters "R. K. & G." on the steam-chest. Under 
the title of "Rogers Locomotive and Machine Works", which the 
concern assumed after the death of Thomas Rogers in 1856, the es- 
tablishment became known the world over. 

Mr. Stuart's duties were simple. A task at which he was set 
by his employers was labelling and filing business letters. Then 
he was directed to meet nearly all the incoming ships. Making in- 
quiry of one captain, the latter presented in answer his log book 



63 

written in Norwegian! Boarding another vessel brought him in 
contact with the commander, a Frenchman of infinite gesticulation, 
and the palaver was finally adjourned to the shore to take "Con- 
seil" as the captain expressed it. 

His desk at the Rogers, Ketchum & Grosvenor office was sur- 
rounded with samples of cotton, while a throng of Southern cotton 
growers and cotton speculators crowded about these samples. To 
him, a newcomer-, the disjointed phrases coming from this hub-bub 
of voices, such as "How is Sea Islands". "What does Liverpool 
say". "Long Staple", etcetera, sounded very strangely. Yet to his 
surprise he found that his employer, keen-sighted broker though 
he was, possessed an exquisite sense of poetry for which he had a 
great fondness. The merchants of Wall Street in the days of 
"Auld lang syne", he perceived were men of liberal education and 
noted that they transacted their business with military promptitude 
and energy. 

At two o'clock his duties took him over to the "Exchange" on 
Wall Street not far from the office. At that hour gathered those 
whose business required personal attendance, and this gathering 
embraced practically all the merchants of the city. 

He studied this daily assemblage at the Exchange with deep 
interest. Some stood in groups, some in pairs. Many were well 
dressed gentlemen bearing themselves with easy grace, but, 
whether well dressed or the reverse, all were on business intent — 
not a lounger among them. The figures and countenances varied. 
Here a figure lean as Shylock. Over there a plethoric Dutchman 
talking to a companion with the unmistakable mahogany tinted 
countenance of the East Indian. Quakers, Spaniards, Yankees — all 
these types were brought together in this throng and fell under his 
observant eye. A diverting forum indeed for one who aimed to en- 
ter the legal profession! 

His mercantile career was brief. Through the kindly efforts 
of Mr. Morris Ketchum he was translated from the babel of the 
counting room to the upstairs quietude of the law office of William 
Emerson, brother of Ralph Waldo Emerson. 

Mr. Stuart used to relate that Ralph Waldo Emerson and his 
brother William, tilting their chairs and projecting their feet over 
the window sill into W^all Street, would talk hour after hour. Seat- 
ed a few feet away, he could not avoid hearing their conversation 
on those lines which, designated usually as Transcendentalism, have 
become famous. Nearly fifty years later he smilingly admitted 
to the intimate friend and admirer of Emerson, the Rev. James 
Freeman Clarke, of Boston, that in 1833 these lines of conversation 
did not appeal to him. "I simply could not grasp them", he said. 



64 

They had not acquired that epigrammatic crystallization which 
forms so great a charm in Emerson's writing and stamps him the 
Umpire Philospher. That very crystallization when it came, as 
finally it did, appealed to him with force, as for instance the follow- 
ing quotations which he pencil-marked one summer afternoon while 
reading Miss Woolson's novel "Anne", where they appeared as 
Chapter headings: 

"Manners — not what but how. Manners are happy ways of do- 
ing things; each once a stroke of genius or of love — now repeated 
and hardened into usage. Manners require time; nothing is more 
vulgar than haste." 

"In our society there is a standing antagonism between the 
conservative and the democratic classes; between the interest of 
dead labor; that is the labor of hands long ago still in the grave; 
which labor is now entombed in money, stocks and land owned 
by idle capitalists, and the interest of living labor, which seeks to 
possess itself of them." 

"We accompany the youth with sympathy and manifold old 
sayings of the wise to the gate of the arena, but it is certain 
that not by strength of ours or by the old sayings but only on the 
strength of his own, unknown to us or to anv, he must stand or 
fall." 

The Rev. Peter Bulkeley of Concord and Charles Chauncey, 
President of Harvard College, were ancestors of both Mr. Stuart 
and Mr. Emerson. The fact, however, was not known to either at 
the time of this meeting. Mutual knowledge that tie of kinship 
existed would have led to more sympathetic acquaintance and 
thereby doubtless then would have given Mr. Stuart that compre- 
hension of Emerson's greatness of intellect; for Mr. Stuart, at least 
in later years, was an unerring critic of a man's mental ability. 

His environment in Vermont had not qualified Mr. Stuart for 
this meeting with Emerson. Quite the contrary. He had been 
brought up to measure men by the inflexible standard that had 
come through the Revolutionary period from an earlier era. 

Captain John Stewart, his grandfather — a rugged veteran of the 
French and Indian and the Revolutionary Wars — did not move in 
line with the trend of philosophic thought which had its starting 
point in Massachusetts. Aaron Stewart gave evidence of depart- 
ure from the early standard of Vermont, doubtless owing to the 
Puritan strain derived from his mother, Huldah Hubbell Stewart, 
for the Hubbells were distinctly of that Puritan type which came 
in the Winthrop company in 1630 and which Oliver Wendell 
Holmes has termed the Brahmin Caste of New England. Homer, 
however, had not come under the influence of his father, but had 
been swayed by the precepts of his deeply loved and respected 
grandsire. Therefore the canons of his earlier years as applied to 



65 

men and modes of thought were destined ere long to be supplanted 
with the measurement decreed by the catholicity which was his 
Bulkeley-Chauncey heritage. That the earlier views were over- 
thrown is not surprising. 

Wafted from the past floats the aura of one's forebears. We 
are trustees for the oncoming generations. Long ago the trust was 
stamped and induction into the trust is ruled by unknown laws of 
heredity which claim at wide intervals the individual best fitted to 
administer the trust with fidelity. Such individual cannot choose 
but serve, albeit subconsciously. With these conditions in view 
the outcome of the conflict could have been foreseen. The question 
was merely the length of time required to give that maturity which 
should qualify him keenly to appreciate Emerson. Observation of 
humanity and profound reflection were to train him while ripening 
into this maturity. The training was to bje on a frontier arena 
confronting able antagonists — training, drilling him to think with 
utmost clearness, and to utter his thought with beautiful precision, 
training inculcating quick sympathy for the poor and lowly, without 
regard to color, creed or race. 

What would have been the career of this versatile 'thinker if 
his formative years had been passed in the historic galaxy of 
"Brook Farm" contemporaries? He was intellectually their equal. 
His capacity for enjoyment of such companionship was of the high- 
est degree. To have communed with Hawthorne woald have been 
a joy to both. 

How similar the inclination of mind of these two! Take the 
following written in 1829 when Mr. Stuart was nineteen. How sim- 
ilar to many of the musings jotted down by Hawthorne in his 
Note Book! 

"Saturday Night, Nov. 1st. 

It is a cold, dreary November night. The rain and hail are 
pattering against my windows and the wind is whistling, moaning 
and roaring among the huge chimneys of the college. Lights can 
be seen in the village through the storm and everything has that 
cheerless aspect so much better felt than described. Yet I am 
always happier at such a time than any other. There is a name- 
less and peculiar pleasure in looking forth upon the low grey clouds 
and the dull desolate storm of November and a kind of excitement 
in walking through it in a dark evening (if well wrapped up). It 
seems as if it was emblematic of the life of man — begun in smiles 
and sunshine and ended in tears and darkness. 

In an evening like this how supremely content a person feels 
to be situated as I am now with a warm fire, a snug room with 
books and a pipe on a table before me, a dish of chocolate on the 
fire and alone! It seems as if you were far separated from the 
bustle and noise of the world and had retired within yourself and 



66 

dependent upon no one but yourself for your enjoyment. By the 
way, I intend that Dan shall take a cup with me. A person in col- 
lege always has a circle of friends with whom he enjoys himself 
much. I spend some of my happiest moments in talking with my 
chum or with Seymour. Last night Seymour and myself sat over 
the embers in his room till 12:00 talking to each other of old times, 
school days, &c. And time slips fast when so employed. I'm half 
the time in his room or he in mine and our thoughts in many re- 
spects are similar. But he has the advantage of me in a fine form 
and graceful carriage. And my chum is the handsomest young fel- 
low I ever saw and notwithstanding that he has a very sound mind 
and no vanity." 

Take another example, where the mood is sadder, written while 
teaching school the following year: 

"Warren, Vt., March 9th, 1830. 
What a curious effect music has! It is the richest and purest 
pleasure and gives birth to feelings which an angel might envy. 
It is a kind of melancholy happiness, a saddened joy that is in- 
finitely superior to all the gratifications of noisy mirth. At such 
a moment the tire<J soul rests from all her cares, from ambition and 
hate, from pride and from all those dark feelings and passions 
which mark the alloy of our nature and the connexion of soul and 
matter. I have been listening for some minutes past to the song 
called "Blue-eyed Mary". The words themselves are pensive and 
touching and when warbled with taste by a pretty girl it is diffi- 
cult to believe that the "blue-eyed Stranger" is not breathing forth 
her blighted hopes and her desolate heart. We are made of clay I 
know, but once in a while a train of feelings will come across the 
dull currents of our hearts that belong to a better world than this 
and cause us like the Peri that had caught a glimpse of Heaven 
to turn back a saddened and reluctant eye upon our own condition." 

How keen the appreciation of Natural Phenomena in the fol- 
lowing: 

"December 11th, 1830, Bridport. 

Ten o'clock. The Northern Lights are more brilliant than 
ever I saw them before. The whole heaven is filled with them 
and they form at the zenith an apex that surpasses in grandeur 
and beauty anything the imagination can conceive of. Slender 
lines of delicate white diverge from the horizon and meet at a 
point like the converged rays of the sun producing a focus of light 
sufficiently strong to read by. But strange as it may seem, the 
stars can be seen through it. It reminds one of Ossian's descrip- 
tion of the spirit of Loda: 

'The wan star twinkled through his form'. 

It is not difficult to fancy that you see in the heavens mighty 
armies contending with each other; banners fluttering and stream- 
ing over them and, in fine 'all the pride and pomp and circum- 
stance of war'. And it has an unnatural appearance that cannot 
be described. I will pardon the rude Indian when he gazed upon 
them or the beleagured inhabitants of Jerusalem for believing that 
they saw in these borealean phenomena the portentous announce- 
ment of divine wrath and the precoursers of their city's destruction. 



67 

I should have no difficulty in imagining that I saw in the sky 
a flaming sword like that ^vhich is said to have hung over Jerus- 
alem. I could myself see the Roman and Judean bands contending 
together; I could see the broken squadrons; the rushing charge 
of the cavalry; the confused rout and all the current of headlong 
flight. And if I had lived eighteen centuries ago I might have 
trembled; as it was I felt a pleasing but sublime awe like that 
produced by the roll of distant thunder. Although we have not 
the rich fruits and exuberant fertility of the tropics yet there is 
beauty in the northern sky compared with which all the splendour 
of a Southern Night would be tame and vapid. This equal distribu- 
tion of natural favours marks the beneficence of the Great First 
Cause and is well calculated to produce at least a momentary 
feeling of gratitude. There is no need of revelation to teach us that 
there is a God. Everything proclaims it from the tiny denizens 
of the grass to the rolling spheres — 

'Forever singing as they shine, 

The hand that formed us is divine'." 

His intercourse with Nature was not less intimate than 
Thoreau's. How he and Thoreau would have fraternized upon the 
expedition which is narrated as follows: 

"Middlebury College, No. 47, Sept. 2, 1829. 

I have had a regular tramp since last I was seated at my old 
table and have seen enough of woods and mountains, rocks and 
streams to satisfy any person that has as Leather Stocking says 
no cross in blood. The Monday after commencement John Hooker 
and myself started to have a walk among the mountains and to 
view the country. We stayed in Starksboro' the first night at the 
house of a Quaker and rioted on fried pork and potatoes at the 
rate of 25 cents for supper, lodging and breakfast. The old Quaker 
sat with his hand in his vest and told long droning stories of the 
hardships which the first settlers endured; how the wolves would 
howl at his door and the bears would carry off his hogs, &c., &c. 
The next day we walked 18 miles through a region where there 
was scarcely a footpath and crossed a high mountain, one of the 
chain of mountains which run through the State. Part of our 
walk was a footpath by the side of a fine trout stream that wound 
its way through the woods, now brawling over the stones or glanc- 
ing down in mimic waterfalls and again gliding along in a still 
deep channel as clear as a spring. Every few rods up started a 
flock of partridges whirling away with a roar into the woods. Our 
path led across mountain streams which we crossed by trees 
bridging the gulf, sometimes at the height of 20 feet from the water. 
These trees would swing and teter as we passed over them in a 
manner not very agreeable. We reached my mother's house about 
3 o'clock Tuesday and I spent that and the next day in talking 
with her and looking at the bees. Thursday a party of eleven 
went to the top of 'Camel's Hump' and we were as wild looking a 
company as ever I saw. We had packs and some carried guns and 
every man had at least three dogs. We had to walk eight miles 
to get to the mountain. The whole of the way was through woods 



68 

and over mountains which I should call high, if I had never been 
on the 'Hump'. Our guides who were accustomed to traveling in 
the woods hurried on like wolves and the fatigue to me was almost 
unsupportable. The forest was so dense that we could not see 
out at all and our guides were forced to climb trees to see in what 
direction the mountain lay. I saw one of them climb a tall spruce 
till he was at least 80 feet from the ground and the trunk at that 
height was not larger than my arm. It made my head swim to 
look at him and it would have made a bear's to follow him. At last 
we reached the top of the mountain after an almost perpendicular 
ascent. This peak according to the measurement of Captain Part- 
ridge is 4186 feet above the level of tide water and Mansfield North 
Mountain or Peak called the 'Chin' is 4279 feet, not quite a hun- 
dred feet higher than the 'Hump'. Mansfield 'Chin' is the highest 
in the State. We had one of the finest prospects in the world. 
All the Northern and Middle part of Vermont; Lake Champlain 
from Ticonderoga to St. Johns; the White Hills in New Hampshire 
and a part of Canada lay spread out below us like a map. It was 
a most glorious prospect! Camel's Hump is singularly formed; 
the top of it is a vast rock plateau on the top of a high mountain. 
This rock on the south side descends perpendicularly 150 or 200 
feet. To go within two or three yards of the edge and look down 
will make a person feel peculiar. I scarcely dared send over a 
stone lest I should fall off with it. Everything below us seemed 
nearly level. I noticed one thing which appeared very singular. 
The land seemed to ascend the farther distant it was or in other 
words, we stood at the bottom of a vast concavity and it seemed 
as if Lake Cham, would immediately flow down to the foot of the 
mountain if its banks were broken; this was probably owing to a 
refraction of the air or to some other cause which could be ex- 
plained on philosophic principles. Below the precipice on the south 
side of the mountain is a vast forest that extends a number of 
miles to the East, South and West; a forest that has never felt 
the axe and still stands in the same gloomy silence in which it has 
remained since the Creation. I stood on a point of rock above the 
precipice when the setting sun was sending the shadow of the 
mountain far to the eastward and touching with an almost un- 
earthly hue the sombre forests below me and the summits of the 
neighboring mountains. A cold mist was flying by me which was 
lit up by the rays of the sun into all the hues of the rainbow and 
seemed to realize the beautiful description by Byron of the Spirit's 
Home : 

'My mansion in the clouds 

Which the breath of twilight builds 

And the summer sunset gilds 

With the azure and vermillion 

Which is mixed for my pavilion.' 

As I stood and looked down upon the forests below, I felt a 
species of awe which I never before felt. It required but a small 
stretch of imagination to fancy the forest below was some vast as- 
semblage of people. In fact, a person could imagine what he 
pleased in such a situation. I delivered a couple of declamations 
without drawing any particular marks of approbation from my 
audience with the exception of a couple of large ravens which had 



69 

established themselves in a large dead tree below me and croaked 
in a manner which might have been mistaken for Encore! En- 
core! but I am not vain. 

John Hooker, my brother and myself stayed on the top of the 
mountain all night. We kindled a large fire and spent the night 
in talking, looking at the stars and trying to sleep. All below 
us was in deep shade and to look down the sides of the mountain 
seemed like looking into a vast cavern, but the stars shown with 
uncommon brilliancy. We were above the mists and smoke of the 
lower world, and they seemed much more bright than they do even 
in a cold winter night. The prospect a little before sunrise was 
grand. Below us on the East for 50 miles in extent it was one 
level sea of fog of the purest white, checkered here and there by 
the top of some blue mountain that rose above it and looked like 
an island as beautiful as even the far famed and poetic Atalantis. 
In a short time, the sun rose far off over the mountains of New 
Hampshire, and when its level beams fell on the mist it assumed 
all the splendid coloring of the evening clouds. It was a sight that 
richly repaid us for all our toil. About an hour after sunrise, we 
took a line of march for home (Duxbury) which we reached 
a little after noon. Saturday we came as far as Lincoln, and Sun- 
day we went to Bristol, attended meeting and in the afternoon 
walked home. If my uncle will let me, I shall go to the White 
Mountains next week with Hyde." 

A tree to him was adorable. Beneath some lofty Weymouth 
pine he would harken to the wind soughing through the boughs, 
and, with a smile, murmur, "It is singing Wareham". That vista 
of Ocean as his vessel passed out the Chesapeake! Many a time 
in later years when a heavy storm was brewing, did he go to Rock- 
away Beach and spend a day looking out over the billows sweeping 
shoreward and muse. Watching a procession of clouds, the ex- 
pression of his grave face took on a kind of rapture. The poetic 
was the side present to his mind. What friendships he would 
have formed at Concord! But this was not to be. He and Ralph 
Waldo Emerson were fated, thus to meet and thus to pass. 

Not being attracted to Emerson his attention was turned to 
Aaron Burr, then a resident of New York. Col. Burr, wearing a 
cloak of military cut and glancing quickly from side to side with 
glittering eyes as he traversed the streets, was in the twilight of 
his career in 1833 a figure at whom passers-by turned to gaze and 
Mr. Stuart studied deeply this survivor of the political era which 
succeeded the Revolutionary War. He listened to the views of con- 
temporaries of Burr and Hamilton and came to the conclusion that 
had the duel at Weehawken resulted in the death of Burr, then 
the martyred Hamilton might have received in some measure the 
obloquy with which Nemesis pursues the successful duellist in after 
life and that has been dealt out to Burr's memory. 



70 

But, even so, he looked upon Aaron Burr as the arch schemer 
who introduced into our laws that type of corporation which is 
disguised to mask the end actually sought and which conceals 
powers of monopoly under ambiguous phrases. He pondered often 
over Burr's subtle intellect and parliamentary dexterity which 
found its congenial employment in this form of covert attack upon 
the policy of our institutions. Often would Mr. Stuart, as he went 
by the old building No. 40 Wall Street (long since torn down) turn 
to gaze at the gigantic statue of the Water God Aquarius with his 
amphora placed above the doorway. He appreciated the subtlety 
that, utilizing for its pretext a period of fever arising from con- 
taminated pumps and wells, could draft an Act entitled "An Act 
to Supply the City of New York with Pure and Wholesome Water" 
and holding nevertheless a Banking Corporation of endless dura- 
tion hidden under its water surface. And the corporation's de- 
cision that Aquarius was a more appropriate emblem than Mercury 
for paper money amused him with its sardonic humor. And he 
thought with what a sarcastic smile Aaron Burr passing through 
Wall Street must have glanced up at that heathen image and have 
chuckled to think how he had opened the door for the army of 
corporations modelled on this prototype which were stealing into all 
the channels of business and dominating private effort and enter- 
prise. Stories were related to him telling how Burr was wont 
secretly to scrutinize the title of some parcel of land. If an avail- 
able flaw caught his attention he would quietly lay his plans and 
then come down upon the unsuspecting owner who would have to 
buy him off. How much truth there was in these stories it is im- 
possible to say. Burr called on a client, a lady who had a club 
foot. This deformity made her waddle in an uncouth manner and 
upon entering the parlor, she begged Mr. Burr to excuse her awk- 
wardness. "Really, Madam", he replied with a most gallant bow, 
"I deemed it merely a graceful limp". And then that retort of 
Burr to Chancellor Kent when the latter, forgetting the proprieties, 
shouted "You are a scoundrel". "The opinions of the learned Chan- 
cellor are always entitled to the highest consideration". 

Mr. Stuart was notified he could come out to Ohio and com- 
plete his legal education in the office of Joshua A. Giddings who 
afterwards attained great prominence as Member of Congress from 
the Northwestern Reserve. Toward the middle of 1834, he depart- 
ed for the West. But he did not go as far as Ohio for he paused 
in Western New York, where he secured a place as law student 
in the office of James Burt at Franklinville, near Olean in Cattarau- 
gus County. He worked for his board at Mr. Burt's and was al- 
lowed the use of the meagre library. 



71 

For sixteen months he rode the circuit in Cattaraugus and ad- 
joining counties in Pennsylvania and New York, and, not having 
been admitted to the bar, tried such Justice of the Peace actions 
as are entrusted to the neophyte. He recalled that in one of these 
actions — in Allegany County, a "horse case", lasting two days — 
he was pitted against a rough hewn young fellow, named Martin 
Grover, whom many years afterwards he found sitting as one of 
the judges of the -Court of Appeals at Albany. 

His journeys in this rough region when the weather was in- 
clement entailed hardship. He used often to reach home at mid- 
night, and tired as he was, would have to care for his equally tired 
horse before going to rest himself. He was in his twenty-fifth 
year five feet eight and one-half, "well set up", as the phrase went, 
and exceedingly active. When weary of riding he would spring 
from the saddle and run two or three miles along the trail thread- 
ing those primeval forests, his well trained horse trotting close be- 
hind. Usually he carried a rifie to bring down such game as he 
encountered. 

One business expedition led him to Fort Wayne, Indiana. He 
made his way to Lake Erie and sailed to Cleveland where the boat 
stopped awhile and then, resuming the voyage till the corner of 
Michigan came in view, turned into the harbor of Toledo. There 
he embarked on a periauger and paddled for more than a hundred 
miles on the Maumee River. The stream flowed sluggishly be- 
tween walls of trees towering above the margin and festooned with 
vines. During the voyage a large wild turkey tried to fly over the 
river and, its strength failing, fell into the water where it was 
easily captured. Landings here and there led to log cabins beyond 
the marshy borders of the Maumee. Near one of these cabins 
towered an immense "button ball" tree, with a curl of smoke rising 
through its foliage. He was amused to find it a "smoke-house". It 
had a rude door and a fire smouldered within the cavity which ex- 
tended up to an orifice among the branches. Hanging from 
pegs were hams, one of which the gaunt sallow mistress of the 
cabin reached with a long pole, and took down to cut a few slices 
to fry with eggs for his meal. Like most of these settlers, she suf- 
fered from chills and fever, and the free use of whiskey were as- 
sumed to hold in check this ailment. Asking her for a drink, she 
stepped to a barrel and filling a bowl handed it to him. Supposing 
it was water, he took a mouthful, only to blister his mouth with 
raw spirit. Thereupon he asked for water. "Go out to the spring", 
she replied, pointing to an enclosure of rails, at some distance. 
Here he found a spring, but it welled up in a swampy spot where 
filthy hogs were wallowing, so he went without a drink. Is it any 



72 

wonder that such careless sanitary arrangements caused almost 
universal sickness among the first settlers in Ohio and Indiana? 
The woodlands were filled with droves of half wild hogs roving 
about for food and only occasionally being fed at the house. 

The raftsmen, who floated logs down the Allegheny River to 
Pittsburgh, Pa., assembled their "drives" at Olean. These lumber- 
men and rivermen were wild and lawless. Olean at this period 
was quite as disorderly as most frontier settlements. Gambling, 
quarrelling and violence rendered Olean anything but attractive to 
him and he was very glad when his classmate Horatio Seymour 
(not the Horatio Seymour, Governor of New York) secured him a 
position at Lockport, N. Y., in the office of Robert H. Stevens, 
District Attorney of Niagara County. He reached Lockport in 
December, 1835, and for about ten years made it his home. On his 
arrival he met congenial young men and social intercourse with 
these educated gentlemen, after the Circuit Riding, in those for- 
lorn, forbidding settlements of Northern Pennsylvania, was indeed 
welcome. Speaking of these men, he used to enumerate John G. 
Saxe, the poet; Sullivan Caverno; Mortimer M. Southworth; Wash- 
ington Hunt, etc. They met at the hotel for their meals. The 
hotel-keeper set out spirits freely with the meals, but whoever 
drank brandy or whiskey was exxpected to buy port or madeira 
wine, and if a boarder failed to do so he became aware soon of un- 
friendly regard on the part of his host. The results of this mis- 
taken hospitality were only too evident in the intemperance at 
Lockport in those days and Mr. Stuart saw some promising careers 
ruined. 

Everything was flourishing and a great future was predicted 
for Lockport. A railroad from Lockport to Niagara Falls was 
just completed and in making a trip over it a curious incident befell 
him. The passenger car was very small and as he entered he trip- 
ped over a sprawling leg. Its owner, an immense man, made no 
move to withdraw the leg, but, most courteously begging his pardon, 
explained that it was rigid* from a wound received during the War 
of 1812. Mr. Stuart entering into conversation responded that he 
had lost his father in that war. The gentleman asked in what 
regiment he served and upon learning said, "Why I was Colonel 
of that regiment! What was your father's name?" "Aaron Stew- 
art from Vermont, an Orderly Sergeant". "Is that so? I distinctly 
recall Sergeant Stewart. He was a splendid soldier". How sur- 
prising was this chance meeting! How gratifying to Mr. Stuart 
to talk with one who knew and appreciated his father. This indi- 
vidual was Colonel Eleazer W. Ripley and he told a great deal 
about the operations in that war. 



73 

In the beginning of this Memoir allusion was made to a letter 
written by Aaron Stewart and it may not be amiss to reproduce it 
here. It is as follows: 

"New Haven, March 11th, 1813. 

Hon'd Sir: — Nature in her unerring decrees has wisely ordained 
a law which imposes a duty from man to man as citizens, teaching 
them their dependence on each other, which constitutes the basis 
and cements the bonds of society. And although one man's talents 
may infinitely outshine another's 'tis a gift he received from the 
predisposes of events and if philanthropy is a companion of knowl- 
edge he must commiserate those below him — not by a cold ex- 
pression of sorrow — but by a benevolent act of kindness, which may 
be done in various ways without expense, and with very little trou- 
ble. You, my honored sir, have this gift within your power. You 
have two sons who are amply provided with the good things of this 
life — another exactly the reverse. He has a request for you to 
make to one of your friends who will be happy to oblige you. I 
have now enrolled my name in the Army of the U. S. The conse- 
quence is my own. The necessity of the war we agree in. 

I have been introduced to Colonel Ripley who commands my 
Reg't. He was a classmate in college with S. Swift, Esq. Mr. 
Hopkins under whom I enlisted told me to carry a line from two 
who are supposed to be men of influence here. I accordingly did 
it. The Colo did not dispute it but told me Nature had signed a 
recommend in my countenance. In the course of conversation find- 
ing I lived in New Haven he asked me if I was acquainted with Mr. 
Swift. I told him I was, he replied that any direction from Mr. 
Swift would supercede the necessity of any further inquiries. 

That, sir, is the request I wish you to make to him. It will 
meliorate my condition and Mr. Swift will not hesitate to grant you 
that favor. I now enclose the substance of what I wish him to 
write with a desire for him to dress it in such a manner as he 
pleases and give it to me in an open letter to Colo Ripley. This fa- 
vor if you concede to it and if it should be my lot to fall in the 
service of the constituted authority of my country, you will have 
the consolating reflection of granting the last favor ever solicited 
by your unfortunate, & wishing to be your dutiful son. 

AARON STEWART. 
Mr. .John Stewart", 
addressed to "Cap't John Stewart, Middlebury". 

Mr. Stuart passed his examination for admission to the bar at 
Utica, July loth, 1836. Joshua A. Spencer was the examiner. Mr. 
Stuart once related that Luther R. Marsh, who sat next to him, 
became perplexed over questions upon "trover" propounded by Mr. 
Spencer. When Marsh was apparently cornered, Mr. Spencer ask- 
ed, "At this stage of the action, what would you do?" Marsh pon- 
dered awhile and replied, "I would advise my client to retain as 
special counsel, Joshua A. Spencer". The humor of this reply car- 
ried the day and with a general "laugh" he was passed. Mr. 
Marsh and Mr. Stuart, meeting thus for the first time, became life- 



74 

long friends; Mr. Marsh was a most tactful speaker and graceful 
writer and a lawyer of rare adroitness. His hallucination as to 
"Diss De Barr Spirit Pictures", which caused such widespread com- 
ment, was a sadness to all who knew Mr. Marsh. They deeply re- 
gretted seeing this courteous, venerable man exposed to the storm 
of ridicule showered upon him by the public press. 

Soon after Mr. Stuart's admission to practice, he formed a 
partnership with Mr. Stevens and later Billings P. Learned came 
from New London, Conn., and was admitted to the firm which 
became very successful. 

The business of the firm required the partners to . do a great 
deal of traveling to and fro between the different county seats, as 
v/ell as to Buffalo and Albany and into Canada West, or Upper 
Canada, as the Province of Ontario was then termed. In his first 
years at Lockport before the railroad links were united in a 
continuous line between Buffalo and Albany, he traveled on the 
packet boats of the Erie Canal and greatly enjoyed the experience. 
These boats were much faster -than the boats of burthen and 
moved, along, night as well as day, with a surge that swept the 
banks. If one was not in great haste this canal transportation 
was a delightful method of viewing the country. 

In May, 1837, he married Miss Jane E. Campbell in Windsor, 
Vermont. She was the daughter of Edward Raymond Campbell. 
Three children were born in Lockport, N. Y., of this marriage. 

Being a fine speaker, he was greatly in demand during the po- 
litical campaigns. He once made a tour with Silas Wright, speak- 
ing with him daily and nightly from the same platform. One of 
his treasured mementos was an ivory-headed hickory cane with a 
silver circlet inscribed, "Homer H. Stuart from Andrew Jackson". 
President Jackson who knew him personally sent this cane to him. 

The stand which Jackson took in combatting South Carolina 
Nullification was in consonance with his ideas. Thus quite natur- 
ally he stepped in the Jacksonian ranks. The views, however, of 
Hamilton, rather than those of Jefferson, appealed to him and the 
period of his activity in the Jacksonian Democracy was merely an 
episode. Although he believed in party organization, the mere 
party name was never sacro-sanct. He clung to the principle, let 
the name go where it listed. But in 1844 he ceased all political 
work, and withdrew from his law firm. Mr. Learned also with- 
drew and a little later went to Albany where he engaged in banking 
and became president of the old Union Bank of Albany. Mr. Stuart 
brought his family to Williamsburgh, then a separate municipality, 
but for many years past a part of Brooklyn. He was corporation 



75 

counsel for Williamsburgh till its union with Brooklyn and also 
had an office in New York City. 

Soon, however, a great grief overtook him in the deaths, within 
the space of six months, of his wife and two of the children. The 
business failure of his brother-in-law, for whom he had endorsed 
notes, swept away all his accumulations and left him without 
means. Leaving Williamsburgh, he settled in New York City and 
applied himself to his profession and to the recoupment of his for- 
tune. 

It was in 1847 that he became acquainted with Edgar Allan 
Poe, whom he used to meet familiarly. He did not endorse Rufus 
Wilmot Griswold's report which has clung persistently to Poe's 
memory, namely, that Poe was a hard drinker. Whatever wildness 
Poe may have shown while a student in Virginia had disappeared 
at the date of this acquaintance, and his bearing was that of a 
quiet and refined gentleman. Mr. Stuart said his manner was shy 
and that he was never garrulous. He would smile as he related 
how Poe was wont to declaim "The Raven" in a singsong tone. 
While not especially attracted by Poe's prose writings, nevertheless 
for his versification he had the greatest admiration and could quote 
whole poems. He would sometimes quote "Annabel Lee" and con- 
trast it with Coleridge's "Kubla Khan" and analyze them in an 
effort to locate the charm. 

He was on pleasant terms with James Fenimore Cooper, whose 
works he delighted reading. He contributed to the Knickerbocker 
Magazine and knew Lewis Gaylord Clark, its editor, George H. 
Colton, the poet, (who died in early life leaving the poem "Tecump- 
seh" a forerunner of Longfellow's "Hiawatha"); Lewis Tappan; 
the versatile and charming Christopher P. Cranch and the courtly 
William Betts, whose delightful country seat, "Merriwood", reveal- 
ed at once the scholar and the aristocrat. Nor must there be omit- 
ted from these friends the name of Andrew Jackson Downing, who 
yielded his life to save that of a stranger, when the burning of 
the Hudson River steamboat "Henry Clay" occurred, and whose 
career of only thirty-seven years bears out the saying, "To Genius 
belongs the Hereafter", for that Genius lives to-day in the landscape 
gardening environing our National Capitol, and in many of the beau- 
tiful estates along the Hudson. 

September 4, 1849, Mr. Stuart married, in New York City, Miss 
Margaret Elizabeth Dunbar, born in Worthington, Conn., May 28, 
1826. She was the daughter of Daniel Dunbar and Katharine 
Chauncey Goodrich. Samuel G. Goodrich ("Peter Parley") was the 
uncle of Mrs. Homer H. Stuart and cordial intercourse existed be- 
tween Mr. Goodrich and Mr. Stuart. Often did Mr. Goodrich con- 



76 

suit him in the preparation of his works and notably in his last 
work, "The Illustrated Animal Kingdom", in two volumes — a work 
which has had few equals for popular reading and reference. 
Adjoining Mr. Stuart's country place was a small farm. Its 
owner — a very aged colored man — was called "Barkalow". He was 
of the best type of the pure blooded African, full six feet, straight, 
well proportioned; his very dark countenance surmounted by snowy 
wool and revealing, when he smiled, beautiful teeth. He had been 
brought from Africa in childhood soon after the Revolutionary War 
and while yet a young man had purchased his freedom. For many 
years he had followed the vocation of supplying the New York 
market with wild fowl shot on the salt marshes and bays, and at 
last by dint of economy had paid for this demesne of a dozen or so 
acres. With the aid of his grandson he tilled successfully and lived 
comfortably. 

Sunday afternoons Mr. Stuart would stroll over to see "Barka- 
low", and would lean against the old rail fence listening to his dis- 
course. He enjoyed hearing him discuss the phenomena of Nature 
of which the aged man had been an acute and accurate observer. 
"Barkalow's" description of life on the "Salt Meadows" was often 
a topic and fascinated Mr. Stuart who loved those beautiful ex- 
panses fringing the Southern shore of "Seawanhaka", the Montauk 
Indian name for Long Island. "Barkalow" related how out upon 
the broad meadow he had erected a comfortable wigwam thatched 
both wall and top with driftweed gathered from bleached winrow 
defining the vanguard line of the new moon tide. It had a hearth 
and a couch of meadow hay. In graphic language he recounted 
the calm that came over him when the hunting of the day had end- 
ed and he and the retriever had returned to the humble roof. How 
he would prepare the evening meal and then lie down to be lulled 
by a cricket choir chirping in the thatch of the wigwam. How, 
when wakeful, he would lie watching the fitful gleam of the fire 
and note the whimpering of wild fowl, winging through the night, 
while from afar came the booming of the Atlantic, Deep calleth 
unto Deep. "There I felt never lonely". As he talked thus, in well 
chosen speech, it was hard indeed to realize that he was unlettered. 
Mr. Stuart often said, " 'Barkalow' was a poet", and a true attach- 
ment existed between them. 

Another "dusky" neighbor was "Aunt Mary Crummell", mother 
of the Reverend Alexander Crummell, who was graduated at Cam- 
bridge, England, took orders in the Church of England, and 
went to Liberia where he officiated for years and where "Aunt 
Mary" died. Later he returned and was rector of St. Luke's, 



77 

Washington, D, C. In 1883 both he and Mr. Stuart were at Sara- 
toga and the Reverend Mr. Crummell conducted the evening ser- 
vice. 

Allusion to "Barkalow" and Alexander Crummell summons to 
mind the Anti-Slavery Agitation. A member of the Stuart family 
had migrated to Virginia and acquired slaves. In 1799 this Stuart 
liberated his slaves and to make sure that their freedom never 
would be taken away, sent them to Londonderry, N. H. "Aunt 
Flora" and her "pickaninnies", "George Washington", "Isaiah" and 
"Salona", made the long journey from "Dixie Land", grew up, lived 
useful, happy lives in this quiet hamlet, and, in the fulness of time, 
one after another, passed away. Aged citizens of Londonderry 
spoke of them with affection as they recounted the friendship of 
yore and the tender ministrations of their mother "Aunt Flora" 
in the sick room. Beneath New Hampshire's turf rest the little 
band of loyal, law-abiding freedmen and the marbles erected by 
the town perpetuate the memory of the love in which "Aunt Flora" 
and "Miss Salona Stuart" were held. Gloaming shrouds the events 
of one hundred years ago and has obscured the Christian name of 
their emancipator. But, like the manumission granted centuries 
earlier by "The Dying Norman Baron", the memory of his righteous 
action lives — . 

"Every vassal of his banner. 

Every serf born to his manor. 

All those wronged and wretched creatures. 

By his hand were freed again." 

Dislike of Slavery was to be expected of a scion of these 
Londonderry Stuarts, one born in Vermont, the first State that 
formally abolished slavery, and this was true in Mr. Stuart's case. 
He realized it while witnessing slave auctions at Richmond, Vir- 
ginia. He never forgot the painful emotion then experienced on 
beholding the sundering of families. Still, on his return to the 
North, he did not feel debarred from taking part in the local polit- 
ical disputes of New York State, even though he could not blind 
himself to the fact that the question as to abolition of Slavery 
in every one of the States must some day be faced by the nation. 

His abrupt withdrawal from politics was due to an incident 
in 1844. An Abolitionist came to Lockport. Mr. Stuart strolled 
in with some companions to hear the address. The speaker was 
wanting in tact and offended the audience. An uproar drowned 
his words every time he tried to plead his cause, but his at- 
tempts to resume were pathetic. The outrageous treatment ac- 
corded the speaker aroused Mr. Stuart's love of fair play. He went 
to the platform, and being well known, there was immediate si- 



78 

lence. He said in effect that this was a land of free speech and 
implored the unruly ones to refrain and to grant this man free 
speech. To the shame of the times the plea was scorned and Mr. 
Stuart departed from the hall. As he passed through the doorway 
the local "boss" sneeringly remarked, "You have been a fool to 
night and you've ended all your political hopes". 

Depressed on account of this incident, recognizing that neither 
Whig nor Democratic party had courage to face the paramount 
moral issue, but not prepared to ally himself with the Extremists 
termed "Liberty Party Men", he absented himself from the political 
field for a long period. Myron H. Clark, as candidate for Governor 
of New York in 1854, led varied Anti-Slavery cohorts into the 
Republican Party. To the support of this party unifying Northern 
sentiment against the aggression of the Pro-Slavery Party, he came 
with the earnestness that might have been predicted as the outcome 
of his long deliberation upon the question at issue. 

The "Peculiar Institution" as it was euphemistically termed, 
had been viewed by Mr. Stuart in its own home land. He had had 
opportunity to regard it in its best and worst aspects while in the 
heyday of its existence. A time so far away, dim, traditional, that 
to the generation of the present day its atmosphere is mere ether. 
He had seen plantations conducted on the plan of "Swallow Barn", 
near Richmond, with masters like Frank Merewether, cultivated, 
intelligent men, kind and indulgent to the slaves, who returned 
their master's care with love and reverence. On such plantations 
as these the conditions were superficially almost a justification of 
the "Institution". Here the bondman first saw the light of day. 
Here he passed his life. Here he loitered or labored pretty much 
as humor served, a mere child in simplicity and insouciance, with 
never a thought of the morrow, coming to equality at last beneath 
the ancient oaks not far from another resting place — 

"Where de ivy am a creepin' 

O'er de grassy mound; 
Dar ole Massa am a sleepin' 

Sleepin' in de cold, cold ground." 

As against this aspect of the "Institution" in its most benign 
form on these arcadian plantations of Virginia was to be contrasted 
the ever present possibility that death of the kind master or his in- 
solvency might send these helpless thralls to the Slave Block. 
That meant sundered home ties and banishment to the dreary cot- 
ton fields of Alabama or Texas or to the pestilential sugar cane 
fields of Louisiana, where the new owner was often an absentee and 
where the remorseless driver flourished the lash. 



79 

Nay there were wrongs even darker if possible. Pennsylvania 
had enacted that slavery should be abolished but unprincipled 
slave owners were suspected of having sold secretly to dealers 
below the "Line", these poor creatures who had attained their 
freedom. Every freeman of color in some of the Southern States 
stood in peril of bondage. Some trifling charge might be lodged 
against him by an evil-minded person. His conviction would follow 
as a matter of course, and, unable to pay the fine, his sale for a 
term of years would take place and the buyer could remove him 
whither he pleased to some distant state where he could never 
prove his right to freedom. 

In this latter aspect the "Institution" stood revealed in all its 
hideous reality. Mr. Stuart had seen both aspects and understood 
the matter thoroughly. All the arguments of its sincerest advo- 
cates had been listened to by him. Believing, as he did, in the 
right of every human being to freedom, it is sufficient to say of 
these arguments that they did not appeal to him. What they were, 
it is needless to rehearse. The arbitrament of the most decisive 
v/ar of modern times, has consigned them to oblivion. 

To touch, save by allusion, on that tense John Brown period, 
October 16th to December 2d, 1859, would be inadvisable. The gaze 
of all the nations focused on that Shenandoah Valley court room, 
Arnold Winkelried re-embodied in "Ossawatomie" Brown, the old 
man's composure before that tribunal, his sudden halt to imprint 
that kiss on the infant, his steadfast tread as he mounted that 
scaffold, flanked by thousands of Virginia's soldiers, while men of 
the time, kneeling in the Northern churches at the moment of his 
soul's flight, were looking beyond that scaffold and its swaying 
burden into the "dim unknown" of the future — all these accounts 
more appropriately can be read elsewhere. 

It is not surprising that Mr. Stuart was very deeply moved. 
And yet none more thoroughly than he was aware that cold justice 
demanded life for life. The logic which impels communities into 
actions repugnant to the feelings was here exemplified. Is it a 
matter of wonder that he, a man of the time, a Northern man of 
Puritan lineage whose forebears had fought at Bothwell Brigg and 
endured at "Undaunted Londonderry", made an address relative to 
John Brown pervaded by intense feeling? Have not the nations 
given a place to John Brown in the Eternal Hall of Fame? 

He spoke frequently in the memorable campaign of 1860 for 
Lincoln and during the Civil War never faltered in his support of 
the government. Next to Lincoln he admired the whole-souled de- 
votion of Secretary. Stanton to the Northern Cause. 



80 

The last time he voted at a Presidential election was when 
with his two sons he cast his ballot for Garfield. He had known 
Garfield personally for a long time. Owing to a change of resi- 
dence, he lost the privilege of voting for the Blaine and Logan elec- 
tors, greatly to his regret, as he was an admirer of Blaine's broad 
views of American Policy and was well acquainted with General 
Logan, 

With the election of Garfield, however, he regarded the three 
Constitutional Amendments and the Reconstruction Legislation as 
beyond the danger of repeal. That, as all this was the final sum- 
ming up of the war pledged by the flower of the Nation's blood, 
the North and West would never consent to abrogation. He be- 
lieved that during Garfield's Administration the public mind w^ould 
turn from contemplation of the War Era to a discussion of new 
issues of a nature essentially different, and yet in spite of his 
strong attachment to the Republican Party during the dark days of 
the Rebellion he was too broad-minded to be thereafter at all times 
and ever a mere party man. Thus in 1876, although he voted 
against Samuel J. Tilden, he nevertheless voted for Lucius Robin- 
son, Democratic candidate for Governor of New York, and again 
for him in 1879, and in 1882 he voted for Grover Cleveland and 
David B, Hill when the latter were candidates for Governor and 
Lieutenant-Governor. His view of the Tariff Question was that 
while Free Trade was theoretically correct, yet in consequence 
of the disturbances in the Nation's affairs resulting from the 
war, that it was, at this period, neither important nor expedient to 
establish it, "Only through Protection can we reach Free Trade. 
When the United States is ready for it and hot till then shall we 
have it". He was not especialy alarmed regarding the tendency 
toward Centralization of Power at Washington for he held that the 
Supreme Court in its interpretation of the Constitution would check 
encroachment upon the reserved powers of the States and like- 
wise that this august tribunal of the Nation would curb the corpo- 
rations. He passed away before the enactment of the Sherman 
Anti-Trust Statute of the 51st Congress, but the principles therein 
enunciated would have met, it is believed, his approval. As already 
remarked, an accident in 1884 debarred him from voting for Blaine 
and Logan, Still, the reflection that the War Legislation was at 
last firmly knitted, enabled him to regard Blaine's defeat as far 
less serious than would have been the defeat of Garfield four 
years earlier. He could not restrain, however, an expression of 
regret that a coincidence of happenings, trifling in themselves, 
should have led to the setting aside of the candidate possessing in 
pre-eminent degree fitness for the Presidential chair. 



81 

At Washington, where during the 60's and 70's he passed 
much time, he belonged to a group which used to gravitate together 
in an unpremeditated manner at the Ebbitt House and in later 
times at the Arlington Hotel. Among these may be recalled the 
witty, genial Henry Martyn Slade; Francis E. Woodbridge; Judge 
Mark Skinner of Chicago; Generals William T. Sherman, Alpheus 
S. Williams of Michigan, Henry M. Whittelsey of the Freedman's 
Bureau, and Benjamin F. Butler of Lowell, Mass.; Edward J. Phelps 
(later commissioned by Cleveland as Minister to England), James 
M. Ashley of Ohio, James H. Saville and ex-Governor John Wolcott 
Stewart of Vermont. 

In these gatherings were narrated many anecdotes of men 
and stories of events in Washington. One of these events occurred 
in the Senate soon after Lincoln had issued his first call for volun- 
teers. A Senator was speaking. His speech was irritating to 
Unionists and while speaking Edward D. Baker, Senator from 
Oregon, entered. Baker, a very handsome man, was in the full 
uniform of a Colonel of the Federal Army and had come to bid 
farewell to his fellow Senators ere leaving for the field. At the 
close of the speech. Baker arose, made an impetuous reply, and 
left the Senate Chamber forever. Not long after he fell while lead- 
ing his regiment at Ball's Bluff. 

One of the anecdotes was the following: After the war an 
elderly man on horseback was observed on a summer afternoon 
approaching Arlington. In front of the mansion he dismounted. 
He did not enter the house but stood for several minutes gazing 
across the Potomac at the City of Washington. His hands were 
clasped and he was in a deep revery. Presently he turned and 
gazed steadily at the mansion and its surroundings. Then re- 
mounting his horse he slowly retraced his course with bowed head. 
Two gentlemen standing not far from the road and engaged in 
conversation had witnessed his approach and when he re-passed 
them they recognized the lone horseman as the Great Commander 
of the Southern Army, Robert E. Lee! It was his farewell to Ar- 
lington, unheralded and without ostentation. 

One evening in the lobby of the Ebbitt House a new comer 
passed the group and went to the desk. He wore a broad brim 
hat but his soldierly bearing could not be disguised by the plain 
dress with not a vestige of uniform. Struck by his strong face and 
modest demeanor, Mr. Stuart inquired who this man was. "That 
is General George H. Thomas", was the reply. It was a great 
satisfaction to Mr. Stuart catching this glimpse of the Hero of 
Chickamauga for whom he had the greatest admiration. 



82 

Despite his friendship with Sherman and his unqualified recog- 
nition of Grant's generalship, there were in Thomas qualities that 
commanded his attention more deeply. He compared him with 
Lee. Both these sons of Virginia at the outbreak of the Rebellion 
were placed alike. Lee disregarded his West Point promise to de- 
fend the Union. Thomas on the other hand stood true to that 
promise. At the end of the war Lee was the recipient of the 
plaudits of his friends and neighbors while for Thomas there was 
coldness and aversion in the Old Dominion. 

General Williams related to the group the doings prior to the 
battle of Chancellorsville. All the morning they could hear far be- 
yond the dense woodland the rumble of wagons and it made them 
extremely uneasy. He went to Hooker to urge that preparation 
be made against an attack, but Hooker seemed strangely dull 
and listless answering only in monosyllables. Unable to overcome 
his apprehensions he went again and found Hooker had not stirred 
from the attitude in which he had seen him last. He seemed to 
be in a thoroughly dazed condition from which it was impossible to 
rouse him to attention. Probably Hooker was suffering from the 
concussion of the shell which struck the porch and had he been in 
normal condition would have interrupted this movement of "Stone- 
wall" Jackson. The death of Jackson that night very possibly 
changed the fortunes of the Confederacy for if he had lived to 
fight at Gettysburg the Northern Army might have been repulsed. 

General Whittelsey once read aloud a few verses which had 
come to him in routine. They were found under the pillow of a 
soldier who was lying dead in a hospital near Port Royal, South Car- 
olina. They deeply impressed the company and the General gave 
the copy to Mr. Stuart, who thereafter kept it in his little Greek 
Testament. They were as follows: 

REST. 

I lay me down to sleep 
With little thought or care 
Whether my waking find 
Me here or there. 

A bowing burdened head 
That only asks to rest 
Unquestioning upon 
A loving breast. 

My good right hand forgets 
Its cunning now — 
To march the weary march 
I know not how. 



83 

I am not eager, bold, 
Nor strong, all that is past. 
I am ready not to do 
At last, at last. 

My half day's work is done, 
And this is all my part; 
I give a patient God 
-My patient heart. 

And grasp His banner still 
Though all its blue be dim; 
These stripes — no less than stars 
Lead after Him. 

Mr. Stuart's trips to Washington were frequent and his so- 
journs were often protracted and he used from time to time, when 
leisure granted, visit the galleries of the Senate and 'House and 
listen to the proceedings. He was enabled thereby to form his 
own estimate of the various members, an estimate which did not 
always correspond with the Public Press estimate. He rated Sena- 
tor Carpenter of Wisconsin as the most brilliant of the Senators 
and the sly humor which Carpenter directed upon the labored 
flights of Charles Sumner — humor entirely lost by Sumner — caused 
Mr. Stuart great amusement. Another whom he rated as an emi- 
nently practical legislator was Senator Hitchcock of Nebraska, the 
father of the "Tree Claim Homestead Act". Another rated highly 
was a Southerner, James B. Bailey of Tennessee, and the same may 
be said of the two Senators from Nevada, John P. Jones and 
William M. Stewart, particularly the latter with the breezy manner 
of the pioneer pervading all his acts. 

In the House he reviewed many of eminent ability, especially 
Thaddeus Stevens, Ashley of Ohio, and Garfield. It is recalled that 
in 1885 he referred to Steven B. Elkins, then a Territorial Delegate, 
in terms of commendation and stated that he possessed a very 
high order of ability. It was a class re-union address delivered 
by Elkins at the Missouri College where Elkins graduated that 
drew forth Mr. Stuart's approval years before the former came 
into the U. S. Senate, in which his influence has been potent. 

Although he mingled with men of public station during a long 
period of years, he himself had a disinclination for office. He took 
an active interest when a principle was being considered by the 
voters, but not with a view of recognition of these efforts. In one 
of the National Campaigns he was very efficient and at its close 
Governor Morgan, the Republican Campaign Manager, sent for him 
and asked what office he expected and was astonished when Mr. 
Stuart quietly replied, "I expect none whatever". 



84 

His tastes were scholarly. He kept up his reading in Greek 
and Latin throughout his life and not a day passed that he did not 
read a chapter in the pocket Greek Testament which he carried 
with him everywhere, as the following anecdote confirms: 

Augustus D. Shepard, Esq., an official of a Bank Note Company 
located in New York, relates that once in Washington finding it of 
importance to consult with Mr. Stuart upon a matter affecting 
the mutual interests of the various Bank Note Companies under 
the U. S. Treasury regulations, late one hot Saturday night sought 
that gentleman at the Arlington, found him still sitting under the 
gas-light' engaged in reading, although in robe du nuit, while the 
breeze from the window played with his waving silver hair. The 
matter discussed required but a few moments. Mr. Shepard when 
leaving expressed his regret for disturbing Mr. Stuart at such an 
hour. Mr. Stuart, with a twinkle in his eye, asked: "How is it, 
Mr. Shepard, that you depart from your rule not to deal with busi- 
ness matters on the Sabbath?" "Oh!" rejoined Mr. Shepard, "It is 
still ten minutes to midnight". "But", he added, "let me ask with 
what absorbing book are you closing the week"? And, upon an 
assenting motion from Mr. Stuart, lifted the book to find it was 
the little Geek Testament. Mr. Stuart's eyes twinkled still brighter 
as he said, "Shepard, I do not find any men who need to read the 
Testament more than we Bank Note people"! 

He studied Bimetalism deeply and it had in him an ardent be- 
liever. In one of the summaries of his reading on the use of gold 
and silver as money, written in 1837, occurs the phrase, "Sixteen 
to One". Apparently this proportion was not unknown to people 
discussing Free Coinage sixty years before the Silver Campaign 
of 1896! 

His lectures and occasional essays were models of clearness. 
One of these essays, "The Soul", was given after his death to a 
friend, who read it and remarked, "If I could count on hearing 
such a sermon as that I would go to church every Sunday". 

His wide range of reading, not alone in English, but "also in 
French, which he read with ease, kept him fully informed to the 
developments of Science and the theories of its exponents. Darwin, 
Alfred Russel Wallace in Malaysia, Henry Walter Bates on the 
Amazon, Huxley, Tyndall and Herbert Spencer in their respective 
fields received careful attention. Layard at Nineveh and the Raw- 
linsons in Babylonia; writers on electricity, astronomy and chemis- 
try — all these were reviewed with thoroughness. In his latest days 
he came to the conclusion that the Darwinian Theory of Evolution 
was not established. He seemed more disposed to accept the The- 
ory of Design so far as the Animal Kingdom was concerned. This 



85 

conclusion in nowise interfered with his admiration of Darwin as 
a minute observer and the leading books of Darwin were in his 
library. Many times did he read the "Voyage of a Naturalist in 
H. M. S. Beagle". 

In spite of the fascination with which Science appealed to him, 
he insisted that the Classics, both Ancient and Modern, ought not 
to be neglected and that broad scholarship could not be acquired by 
the mere perusal of works upon Science. 

His inclination was for the chair of the scholar, there to medi- 
tate the themes appealing to philosophers. He had firmness to re- 
sist the call of this pleasing avocation and subordinate it to the 
duties of his chosen vocation for which he had great capacity. In 
temperaments like his, wh§re on equal balance poise the scales of 
scholarship and administrative ability, occur display of moods be- 
yond those of the ordinary individual. Such combination of intel- 
lect and executive power is marked ever by moods and these vary- 
ing moods invested Mr. Stuart's personality with a charm which, 
although perceived by all, nevertheless baffled analysis. He would 
have adorned the position of college president. 

His sense of humor was keen and he could take a facetious 
remark as well as utter one, Joseph H. Choate came up one 
day during a recess in court and observed, "I have always wonder- 
ed whether your full name is Homer Hesiod Stuart or Homer 
Herodotus Stuart". This whimsicality appealed to Mr. Stuart and 
he joined in the general mirth, which the sally provoked. Once 
a clergyman after conversing with him finally asked, "What is your 
business"? Mr. Stuart's eyes twinkled, as he regarded the inquisi- 
tive dominie, and in a spirit of mischief he replied, "I am engaged 
in printing". He was then president of a Bank Note Company, so 
that this w^as a true answer to the question as put. Had it been, 
"What is your profession"? — and doubtless "profession" and not 
"business" w-as the word intended — his answer would have been 
different. Another time while crossing the office of the Arlington 
Hotel at Washington, a passing individual, whom he did not know, 
halted and said, "How are you, Judge"? Whereupon Mr. Stuart 
calmly replied, "I am neither a Judge nor a Colonel", and moved 
on. A household bill written in an illegible hand came in from A. 
T. Stewart's dry goods establishment. Unable to decipher the 
hieroglyphics, he returned it, first pencilling across the face, "This 
bill seems to charge me with 'one bottle of rum and parts of sev- 
eral others'," 

The Village Literary Union scheduled him for a lecture and 
he chose as his topic, "What of the Workingman?". Ex-Governor 
John A. King presided. The audience was dignified. Everything 



86 

boded an attentive group of listeners. The lecture was proceeding 
smoothly when an utterance tinged with an inimitable Milesian 
brogue was heard in one of the front rows. "Sound Mor-rality"! 
Directing his eyes to the speaker Mr. Stuart recognized Father 
Farley, the Catholic priest, and saw moreover that he was uttering 
this audible allocution in sincerity. Continuing the lecture, these 
"Sound-Mor-ralities" came at intervals but grasping the humor of 
the situation he kept on to the close. 

The lecture was not intended to have a humorous flavor. There 
was no doubt however that "Sound-Mor-rality" imparted to it such 
a flavor and Mr. Stuart and his friends never could recall that 
evening without "inextinguishable laughter". 

It appeared that the Reverend Father, noticing the title of the 
lecture, apprehended that its sentiments might reflect upon mem- 
bers of his flock. So he hied himself to the hall prepared for com- 
bat and the great relief at the sentiments which fell upon his ears 
'led him then and there to evince his approval of their "Sound- 
Mor-rality". 

His country place was a Mecca for friends and a never ceasing 
delight to him. One season he planted a few acres in grain for 
the sole purpose of reaping it by Virgilian precepts. He watched 
its daily growth till the wheat ripened and then had a man cut it 
with a sickle, binding the sheaves as he went along. It was indeed 
picturesque — idyllic — but before the reaper finished his task a 
great proportion of the kernels shelled out, leaving little to carry 
to the quaint old grist mill at the foot of the millpond. A flock 
of ducks waddled out from the barnyard to the stubble and quacked 
gleefully for days thereafter gleaning in this latter day field of 
Boaz. The whole performance was amusing to Mr. Stuart and to 
his friends, but was beyond the comprehension of the hard-headed 
farmers of the vicinage, who simply could not understand such 
farming. 

A pleasant reminiscence is the recollection of Mr. Stuart seated 
in a Windsor chair on the piazza of his country residence after 
supper one summer evening, calmly smoking a long reed-stemmed 
Indian pipe, while a tame crow perched on his shoulder was gab- 
bling to him in a low confidential tone, once in a while gently tweak- 
ing his ear or reaching down to pull the pencil from his coat 
pocket. Finally Mr. Stuart stroked the bird's glossy feathers and 
said "Goodnight Dick. Go to bed". Whereupon with a final croak 
and giving a flirt to his plumage the bird flew to a pine tree for the 
night. 

On the place grew a hundred cherry trees or more, and one 
Fourth of July invitations were sent to all the children of the neigh- 



87 

borhood to attend a "Cherry Party". When assembled he selected 
an old "Ox Heart" growing where it interfered with the carriage- 
way, and directed that it be felled. The excitement and delight 
of the little ones was intense as the tree and its beautiful burden 
of fruit slowly toppled over and with shouts they scrambled through 
the branches till not a cherry remained. 

He was very kind to little children. The Bank Note Company 
of which he was president, was located in Greenwich Street, and 
the engineer in the basement one sultry afternoon had trouble with 
the children who teased him by dropping things through the grat- 
ing. Mr. Stuart stepped out, assembled the little ones, and ex- 
plained that he felt sure they did not really intend to be annoying. 
Then he closed by telling them to go to the candy store down on 
Liberty Street, where he sent a clerk to order ice cream. With 
enthusiastic cries they rushed away and presently could be seen 
seated on doorsteps, each child occupied with a cone of ice cream 
resting on brown paper. They never troubled the engineer after 
that request of Mr. Stuart. 

He felt sympathy for young men who aimed at professional 
careers, and in quiet ways he aided by securing them positions in 
the Bank Note Company, while they pursued their studies out of 
hours. Mindful of the earlier years of his own professional life, he 
tried always to distribute the legal work of the company so that 
a share of it would reach the struggling practitioner — "giving him 
a chance". The invisible barrier said to stand between generations 
seemed in his case to have been removed and the distinction which 
difference of age usually interposes between individuals was scarce- 
ly perceptible in his intercourse with the younger generation. 

Mr. Stuart was regular in his church attendance. He attended 
the Congregational Church known as the Broadway Tabernacle 
presided over by Rev. Dr. Thompson and subsequently by the learn- 
ed Rev. Dr. Roswell D. Hitchcock. After the latter withdrew to be- 
come president of Union Theological Seminary, Mr. Stuart attended 
the Brick Presbyterian Church on Fifth Avenue and 37th Street 
for many years during the pastorates of Rev. Drs. J. O. Murray 
and Llewellyn D. Bevan. With the latter his friendship was strong. 
He admired his scholarly mind, the eloquence of his sermons and 
the untiring devotion that he gave to the church and regretted his 
return to England. When absent from New York he attended 
whatever church proved convenient irrespective of denomination. 

Another characteristic was the purity of his language. He did 
not use profane expressions and this is the more notable as his 
natural temper was hasty. Nor had he any tolerance for low anec- 
dotes. He was charitable in his judgments and if he could find no 



88 

good to speak of a man, would pass the matter in silence. He 
disliked the term "Nigger" and its employment as a term of re- 
proach by white people he regarded recoiling on themselves, rather 
than on the colored brother at whom it was directed. 

In the country the family went, storm or shine, to the. village 
church. Returning home after the service Mr. Stuart would start 
early in the afternoon for the Sunday walk through the woods with 
his family and quite likely several of his children's little friends 
would come also. These were delightful expeditions whether in 
winter or summer. Nothing was without interest to him on these 
rambles. 

In spring time and summer took place those thrilling naviga- 
tions of the leaky old flat-bottomed skiff on the mill-pond across 
the field of water lilies at its upper end to the impassable jungle 
where the red-winged blackbirds chattered at the intruders. 

In the beautiful October afternoons came those strolls through 
the fields. Pausing by the tall chestnut standing on the selvage of 
the woodland and taking off his coat he would pick out a burr 
cluster and throw at it a stout stick with a whirling motion that 
deftly rapped the limb in passing and drove a shower of nuts from 
the gaping burrs. 

In the winter the explorations led into the frozen swamps in- 
accessible at other seasons. Their secrets were exposed. At a 
pool covered with ice, clear as a window pane, he would look 
through and call attention to the activities in that quiet spo.t The 
dace darting to and fro when the shadow fell across their ken. The 
caddice larvae dragging behind them their "huts" built of bits of 
wood or of tiny particles of quartz — in short the varied life fulfilling 
its destiny beneath the shelter of this icy roof oblivious of the 
wintry rigor above. Sometimes a muskrat house was reconnoitred 
and a few thumps on the top of this would send its denizens scurry- 
ing along their water paths beneath the ice for refuge elsewhere. 
Once these evicted ones were avenged when their disturber slipped 
through an air hole and had a cold bath. How he laughed as he 
extricated himself with glowing face and retreated to build a rous- 
ing fire on terra firma! 

He possessed a most varied, comprehensive store of informa- 
tion, but in utilizing it he never made a pedantic display. His 
speech was lucid, whether addressed to a companion or to an assem- 
blage. Indeed and indeed was his "summing up" at the end of a 
trial a pleasure to the auditors! The clear, flexible tones. The 
graceful opening. The cogent reasoning, lightened with unexpected 
flashes of humor. Ordinarily thirty or forty minutes sufficed for 
his argument even though the trial had lasted several days. In 



89 

that interval he laid before the jurymen his client's cause, holding 
their attention and winning their verdict. Conversant by thorough- 
ness of preparation v^^ith every detail of his cause, wasting no time 
on non-essentials, he riveted the attention of court and jury. More- 
over, he refused to undertake an action when he deemed the client 
was not morally in the right. 

He possessed foremost ability as a lawyer but his efforts as a 
peacemaker often cut short a promising action, for he would bring 
the opposing sides together and a settlement would result. It was 
reported that one of his clients, an exceedingly rich man, sent him 
instructions to draft a will which Mr. Stuart perceived would dis- 
inherit a daughter. He summoned the client and told him bluntly 
he would not draw such an unrighteous will. The client went off 
and in a fury told several of his friends. The rebuke, however, had 
not been thrown away. After the man's death it was found he had 
not disinherited. 

With his brothers at the bar his intercourse was marked by 
dignity and good feeling. If, however, his opponent grew over- 
bearing, Mr. Stuart was quite capable of giving a hint tinged with 
irony that would bring him within bounds at once. 

Charles O'Conor's capabilities as a lawyer were rated as ex- 
traordinary by Mr. Stuart. Mr. O'Conor told him that once he 
dropped all work for four months and without referring to a book 
planned an intricate will for a client. During that time his thoughts 
were concentrated upon this subject. When satisfied he wrote out 
the document. As an instance of O'Conor's keen mind he mention- 
ed O'Conor's argument in the noted case of Manice vs. Manice in 
the Court of Appeals. He was one day reading a legal opinion of 
one of the judges with whom O'Conor was unfriendly and at the 
end was written (the book belonging in O'Conor's library) in the 
handwriting of O'Conor, "The reasoning would support the con- 
verse". The two would often drift away from legal matters and 
discuss topics relating to theories of government, religion, &c. 

One of these conversations turned upon Papal Infallibility. Mr. 
Stuart propounded the following query, substantially as follows: 
"Mr. O'Conor, you are a lawyer and represent one side of an 
action. Your opponent is likewise a lawyer and represents the 
other side of the action. Neither of you agree and the cause is 
tried before another lawyer, namely a judge sitting at Special Term. 
He decides in your favor. Your adversary appeals to the General 
Term composed of three more lawyers. They divide and two of 
them unite in an opinion reversing the decision of the judge at 
Special Term while the third General Term judge dissents and de- 
livers an opinion sustaining your judgment. From the entry of the 



90 

General Term judgment of reversal you appeal to the Court of 
Appeals and there again the seven judges stand four to three in 
favor of reversing the General Term and sustaining the Special 
Term. Your opponent petitions for a re-argument. Assume as an 
extreme instance that the petition is granted and the Court of 
Appeals on the re-argument changes its position and stands four 
to three in favor of sustaining the General Term. Now if the eleven 
judges, men of profound reasoning powers, who passed upon the 
question at issue were so perplexed and shifted their position how 
can you ascribe infallibility of judgment to one man?" 

Mr. O'Conor hesitated some time and finally replied, "When 
I am sick I call in a doctor and take his advice." 

A trait that impressed Mr. Stuart was the deep sense of obliga- 
tion O'Conor manifested when a favor had been extended. He 
never forgot a favor. Mr, Stuart heard casually through an ac- 
quaintance that a gentleman named Lamberton living in 1860 near 
Pensacola had been of service to O'Conor. Lamberton was an out- 
spoken Unionist and upon the secession of Florida was mobbed 
and driven away, losing all his property. O'Conor, however, con- 
sidered that the favor had not been paid and upon the death of 
Lamberton he invited the latter's son to study law in his office and 
showed real interest in the young man. Many times he had him 
come to Nantucket to visit him and finally beqeathed to him a val- 
uable law library containing all the reports from the earliest date 
in New York State down to the period Of Mr. O'Conor's retirement 
to Nantucket. 

O'Conor's headquarters were on the top story of Brown Broth- 
ers' Building in Wall Street and one could see him seated in an arm- 
chair at the end of the corridor, eyes shut, motionless, apparently 
wrapped in slumber. Deceptive pose! He was thinking — thinking. 
His name did not appear on the Brown Building office directory 
for he hated to be bothered with clients. His nature was a strange 
compound. His intensity of conviction as to the law in a case 
wherein his interest was aroused was so great that he could not 
yield his opinion. His argumentative processes proceeded upon 
rectilinear lines that were never bent by what (for want of a better 
term) we may denominate human refraction. Too proud to allow 
for this refraction, where these lines encountered the atmosphere 
of inferior reasoners, he sometimes failed while the lines of his 
more wily antagonists centred effectively at a lower plane. . Herein 
the worldly wisdom of David Dudley Field surpassed him in Mr. 
Stuart's opinion and the latter spoke on this point from an ac- 
quaintance of many years with both Field and O'Conor. 



91 

The judges of the New York City Courts aroused little interest 
in his mind. There was a feeling that their task was easy— merely 
making choice of the arguments that represented the days of 
thought and research of the advocates. Then again, when he came 
back to the bar, after nearly twenty years, with the exception of his 
old friend, Charles P. Daly, Judge of the Common Pleas, there was 
scarcely a judge of the Ante-bellum era on the bench. Toward the 
Court of Appeals he felt very differently for he regarded its per- 
sonnel during the period 1879 to 1885 as equal to the Supreme Court 
at Washington. 

As remarked before, he had the highest ability for conducting 
litigation, but he was called, from the bar, as so many lawyers are, 
into the management of corporations and in the 60's became presi- 
dent of the Continental Bank Note Company. 

Upon taking the presidency of this corporation he proceeded 
with the thoroughness, which was a characteristic of his nature, 
to acquaint himself with every detail of its highly technical busi- 
ness. The business was about as different from the legal work 
to which he had beeh accustomed as could be imagined. But its 
difficulties did not daunt him and as steadily as possible he sys- 
tematized the affairs of the company. Before a great while it was 
possible for him on sitting down at his desk in the morning to tell 
Immediately just what the condition had been at the close of the 
previous day. Schedules showed the operations proceeding in each 
room of the main building, as well as those in buildings located 
elsewhere. These schedules gave the name and residence of every 
individual in these rooms whether superintendent or humble errand 
boy. Moreover he made it known that he was accessible to each 
and all and whenever any employe came to him he listened care- 
fully. This course prevented misunderstandings and the concern 
was unusually free from labor difficulties. Once or twice during 
business depression wages and salaries were reduced, but every 
employee knew that Mr. Stuart's salary had been reduced at his 
own instance in the same percentage. This open-handed treatment 
rendered them thoroughly loyal and it was very seldom that he had 
trouble with his employees. 

The period fell in that extravagant era which marked the 
Civil War and one of the first things he did was to ascertain the 
exact cost to the corporation of each class of work. To accom- 
plish this it was necessary to examine groups of computations fur- 
nished by engravers, platemen, &c. All these were carefully veri- 
fied by him and, when their accuracy was established beyond a 
doubt, were tabulated. With these expense factors ascertained, 
the corporation relied no longer on the earlier hap-hazard methods 



92 

but knew exactly what it was doing when a bid was offered for 
work. Sometimes, of course, it failed to be a successful bidder 
but one could venture to guess that the successful rival would find 
meagre profit on the transaction. 

The bookkeeping was an improvement over the methods then 
too generally prevalent and it was possible for the directors at their 
meetings to have immediate answer to any question they might ask 
while figuring on some prospective bid. This was indeed essential 
for the corporation was carrying out contracts of great moment 
where the variation of a cent might represent serious loss. In those 
days the currency of the United States was not engraved and print- 
ed entirely at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. The five-dol- 
lar bills and postage stamps for instance were engraved and printed 
by the Continental Bank Note Company in New York City under 
the supervision of inspectors sent from Washington. The regula- 
tions imposed were of the most rigid nature. Every sheet of paper 
had to be accounted for as well as every plate. It was a most 
interesting sight to watch the operations and viev/ the blank sheet 
slide into place, the plate descend and rise instantly revealing four 
fresh "Vs" on the sheet which then passed to a neighboring press, 
to receive the imprint of the reverse. The ink used was most 
carefully selected and down in the basement was an "ink grinder" 
in which these peculiar gummy inks, red, blue, green, yellow and 
black, then used in this sort of work, were being treated. Mr. 
Stuart noted how closely these inks resembled paint and gave direc- 
tions to have the residue, which was scraped from the plates while 
in operation, turned each day into a cask. In the course of time 
this was filled with a blend of all the colors used in printing the 
output of the establishment. The cask was then sent to the country 
and its entire contents used in painting the barn. The effect was 
surprising and exceedingly pleasant to the eye and the painting 
lasted over thirty years. 

A faculty of aid to him in the supervision of the Bank Note 
Company's operations lay in a peculiarity of eyesight. From the 
age of eighteen he was dependent upon spectacles, but when he 
read, or examined objects at close range, he would push the glasses 
above his eyebrows and hold the book or other object about four 
inches from his eyes. He would do this in light that for most peo- 
ple was too dim for distinct vision. Per contra he could turn his 
gaze directly at the sun without especial discomfort. Sometimes 
he would take an engraved bond or certificate of stock or a United 
States bill and after a moment's scrutiny tell the name of the man 
who had engraved the plate. Yet his eyes, except while he was 
engaged in this examination had no marked appearance of near- 



93 

sightedness. It was doubtless due to this critical faculty supple- 
mented by his natural artistic discrimination in selecting the sub- 
jects that the steel engraved vignettes prepared for the Continental 
Bank Note Company were brought to so high a standard of beauty 
and appropriateness that no advance has been made since that 
time. The so-called "Process Work" of the present day, by virtue 
of cheapness and rapidity of production, has superseded to a great 
extent the laborious efforts of the" steel engraver. 

Among the artists employed to furnish subjects for the vig- 
nettes was the talented Felix O. C. Darley and many vignettes re- 
producing his designs are in use to-day on engraved securities, and 
these Darley designs in artistic suitableness have seldom been ap- 
proached and have never been excelled. Contracts were performed 
for the United States government; for Japan and other countries, 
besides printing and engraving securities for many railroads. The 
company's dividends to its shareholders were very satisfactory and 
the number of employees ran up into the hundreds. 

The effect of this careful supervision of affairs was apparent 
on his retirement in the form of a large surplus accumulated by 
the company during his regime. 

The engraving work executed by the Continental Bank Note 
Company for Japan resulted from his acquaintance with the Japa- 
nese Embassy, which visited Washington in 1870. He met Count 
Jushie Hirobumi Ito there and enjoyed a very pleasant intercourse 
with him and other members of this Embassy. It was strongly urged 
that Mr. Stuart and his wife should come to Japan and make a 
visit, but Mr. Stuart, who was not a good traveler by sea, could 
not bring himself to undertake the long voyage across the Pacific 
Ocean. These pleasant relations with the Japanese of high rank 
continued for years and many of them were welcome visitors at 
his home. All were polished, courteous gentlemen, and some, for 
instance, Sinichiro Kurino, the Minister at St. Petersburg, Russia, 
(at the outbreak of the late war between Japan and Russia), and 
Marquis Ito whose assassination in Korea has lately shocked the 
world, have written their names on History's Tablet. 

In 1879 he withdrew from the Bank Note Company to resume 
the practice of his profession and was engrossed therein when 
suddenly the summons came for him to rest from his earthly tasks. 

On the morning of October 5, 1885, he read awhile after break- 
fast in the little Greek Testament and placing the marker closed it 
— for the last time. Then he went down town and attended the 
opening Fall Session of the Supreme Court. After finishing his du- 
ties there he walked to his office, just opposite the old Emerson 
office where half a century earlier he first looked out upon Wall 



94 

street. It is recalled that he gazed some time in silence across the 
street at the old building. Then saying he felt weary and would 
return home, he started to depart and expired before reaching 
the sidewalk. Looking at the Testament that evening it was seen 
he had been reading the Twelfth Chapter of St. Luke. Years have 
rolled away, but the marker still is kept where this gifted and 
sincere man, this "loved and loving husband, father, friend", left it 
on that bright October morn. 

The letters which follow are selected from many referring to 
Mr. Stuart and reveal the impression he made upon these friends: 

Arnoux, Ritch & Woodford, 
18 Wall Street, 

New York, 6th October, 1885. 

Dear Stuart — I was very deeply shocked this morning on learn- 
ing that your father was no more. Only yesterday, I looked at him 
again and again and thought how sturdy he seemed, when I saw 
him in court. 

Be assured you have my heartiest sympathy in this hour of your 
sorrow. 

Yours, &c., 

BRADFORD W. HITCHCOCK. 



Rooms 10, 11 and 12, Law Offices of 

Glover Building, James H. Saville, 

1419 F St., N. W. Frederick A. Starring. 

Washington, D. C, Oct. 10th, 1885. 
Inglis Stuart, Esq., 
63 Wall St., N. Y. 

My Dear Inglis — Your favor of 8th inst. came this morning. I 
saw the notice of your father's death in The Tribune and we were 
shocked beyond measure. It was so sudden, and he seemed in 
such excellent health and buoyant spirits only three days before 
when I saw him. Will you kindly convey to your mother, brother 
and sisters my sincere and heartfelt sympathy as well as that of 
my wife for your sad bereavement. You can well understand how 
keenly we feel for you, as you know we have always held him in 
the highest esteem. I do not think the death of anyone out of our 
own immediate family would have touched us so nearly. My wife 
wants his picture. Can you not procure and send me a good one? 

In the midst of our grief we have one consolation. He was a 
man of noble qualities of head and heart, whom all respected and 
those admired most who knew him best. He may not have left his 
children a fortune in mere worldly goods, but in his noble face and 
honorable career he has bequeathed to them a source of just pride 



95 

which wealth could not buy or mere worldly success attain. May 
his memory ever prove a guiding star to the feet of his children. 
Remember us to your family and believe us always. 

Your true friends, 

JAMES H. & SUSAN SAVILLE. 



Oct. 11, 1885. 

Dear Inglis — The sad news of your father's death reached me 
yesterday, and I hasten to express my sympathy with your afflic- 
tion. The suddenness of the blow must have made the bereave- 
ment all the greater, and I know you feel the irreparable loss 
deeply. 

I shall always remember your father as a man of extraordinary 
presence, one of the finest looking men I have ever seen, my beau- 
ideal of the true Roman Senator. 

I can remember him from my earliest childhood in Long Island. 
Remember me to Mrs. Stuart and your brother and sisters, and 
believe me, for weal, for woe, your friend. 

MADISON GRANT. 



Middlebury, Vermont, 13th October, 1885. 

My Dear Cousin Margaret — I was greatly shocked at the sud- 
den notice of Homer's death and regretted that a chapter of acci- 
dents prevented my attendance at the funeral. 

I can hardly realize that Homer is dead. He was always to 
me the personification of manly vigor physical and mental. Such 
from my earliest childhood was my impression of him. He was 
never sick, never weak. Age did not seem to quench the fire of 
youth in him. His white hair fringed a face which bloomed without 
a wrinkle with the freshness of early prime. He never seemed old 
to me and in his presence I forgot the lapse of time, he was so 
bright and vivacious and looked so like a youth prematurely grey. 
What a kingly presence was his! What a winning, sensitive, gen- 
erous, loyal nature he had! We who knew him best knew all this 
and more. He was the soul of manly honor. He was incapable 
of falsehood or faithlessness. He had royal endowment. Farewell 
my dear lost elder brother. I shall cherish early tender memories 
of our brotherly intercourse in these later years with never an un- 
kind word or thought between us. I mourn with you my dear 
cousin and with yours. May our Heavenly Father comfort and 
help us all. 

Your affectionate cousin, 

JOHN W. STEWART. 



96 

Brick Church Parsonage, 

14 East 37th Street, New York. 

Dear Mrs. Stuart — I have to thank you very sincerely for your 
husband's "Occasional Papers". I have read them with the great- 
est interest. They bear, as I expected, the impress of a strong, 
clear, vigorous mind. But what surprises me in them is the imagi- 
native power which gleams out everywhere in the most striking 
way. The contrast between the two pictures of Jacob and Saul is 
most remarkable in this respect. 

There is a fine mingling of restraint and confidence in the 
paper on The Soul — an undertone of unstated argument which 
makes it very fascinating — ^charming is too light a word. Indeed 
I hardly know how to describe the peculiar effect of personality — 
distinct, well-poised, intensely meditative — which these papers have 
made upon me. 

You have given me a privilege which makes me feel again and 
again how much cause I have to regret the loss of that yet greater 
privilege of personal intercourse with so serene and noble a mind. 

Believe me, 

Very faithfully yours, 
Nov. 4, 1885. HENRY J. VAN DYKE, JR. 



Jamaica, Nov. 11, '85. 

My Dear Mrs. Stuart — Will you be so good as to ascribe my 
long delayed letter to anything rather than want of sympathy with 
you in your sorrow. When I first saw the notice of the death of 
Mr. Stuart I was absent at the meeting of Presbytery, and returned 
as soon as possible and made arrangements to present my sympa- 
thy in person. On looking over the paper I found that you had 
all gone to Berlin, Conn. Since that time I have been to New 
York but once — and then on business — returning as soon as it 
was over to meet an engagement in Jamaica. 

But, after all, I feel that I have been neglectful and I am re- 
proached by my seeming want of feeling. To both of us, Mrs. 
Lampman and myself, the death of Mr. Stuart was a great shock 
and a great sorrow. We loved him — as who could help loving him? 
To me he was especially congenial. I never was weary of watch- 
ing his peculiar mental processes. He was a born philosopher 
— never contenting himself with the surface of things, but always 
unwrapping until he approached their center of beginning. Here in 
this very room where I am writing I remember a long talk of his 
on the condition of the Immortals. He had dropped in casually, 
and I had urged him to dine, and after dinner he climbed up to my 
study and there through the curling smoke discoursed of those 
things of which Plato and Socrates were wont to talk, and 
I could not help thinking that I had with me one of the philosophers 
of old— inspired by the later Christian Revelation. And I remem- 
ber his face almost as well as his mind. I recall how the eyes be- 
gan to narrow and the smile creep along the lips long before his 
laughter openly began. Indeed he was to me a delightful friend 



97 

and I miss him and sorrow for myself over my individual loss. 
How great your sorrow must be I can partially realize. 

But to have known so rare a man intimately, to have been 
dearly loved by him, is a memory worth having and is some com- 
pensation for your loss. If the pain is sharper the memory is 
dearer. 

Will you accept at this late day the assurances of my sym- 
pathy and regard that I do not know well how to express. For your 
comfort, I can only refer you to that deep conviction of an im- 
mortal life which he cherished and where I am certain you will 
meet him. 

Affec'y yours, 

LEWIS LAMPMAN. 



Hartford, Conn., Oct. 5, 1885. 

Our Dear Cousin Maggie — Our hearts are with you and your 
stricken circle in your great bereavement. We esteemed and loved 
Mr. Stuart as a friend and as a man. He had great gifts, and his 
conversation was always most pleasing and instructive. How many 
good talks we have had with him. How I have loved to draw him 
out and get at the large treasury of his information and his tho'ts. 
How varied his a,<*Quirements and how easily and genially he was 
wont to express himself to friends as he sat in his easy chair and 
talked. I think he had a very capacious mind and very active and 
open to all things on all sides. I sincerely loved him and have 
grateful recollections of his many kindnesses to me personally. 
The days we have spent so pleasantly in your charming family 
often come up in review, and the near friendship we have shared 
with you all has been one of the threads of gold running thro our 
life since Emily first introduced me to you as her most cherished 
friend. 

Let us think that these joys of affectionate and intimate inter- 
course are never to cease and that on the other side they will be 
renewed and exalted. I know Mr. Stuart tho't much on the great 
themes, and I think his departure in its suddenness was an enviable 
one for which I trust he was ready, as the last verses he read were 
timely and preparative. Don't try to feel — the shock which takes 
away the keenness of sorrow has an errand of mercy. The God of 
peace be with you all. 

Yours affy., 

LUCIUS CURTIS. 



10 Benton Avenue, 
Middletown, Orange Co., N. Y. 

Sept. 8, 1896. 
Inglis Stuart, Esq.: 

My Good, Young Friend — "Much thanks" for your letter of the 
6th instant. I had forgotten about the balance in my favor in the 



98 

New Amsterdam Bank; and, but for your kindness, should not have 
known of it. $69 don't grow- on every bush, now-a-days; and I was 
glad to get this addition to my slim resources. It is a great thing 
to have friends around. 

Yes, I have had a lovely summer; everything pleasant, and 
the feathered biped, with his quills, has hung pendulous and 
elevated. 

The axle-trees of time have been lubricated with the perfumed 
oil of roses. 

It is pleasant to think, as I often do, of your most excellent 
father; and his kindly ways and rich discourse. I have some let- 
ters from him and some pamphlets of his, that I prize among my 
treasures. He was a profound thinker. 
I am, with repeated thanks, 

Yours sincerely, 

LUTHER R. MARSH. 



Sea-Lawn, (Wave Crest) Far Rockaway, L. I. 

June 25, 1905. 
Mr. Inglis Stuart, 

69 Wall St., New York. 

My Dear Mr. Stuart — The interesting Memoir of your father, 
contained in the "Stewart book" we have read with great pleasure. 
I am only sorry that my sister Mrs. Story could not have enjoyed it 
with us, but she is at Englewood and we are here. 

Your good father was a noble man, with marked characteris- 
tics; his ability and culture made him a delightful friend. Often 
have I thought of him, and valued the friendship which it was my 
privilege to enjoy. 

You may well have pride in the memory of such a father. Mrs. 
Brinckerhoff joins with me in love and kind remembrance to your 
mother. 

With thanks for the book, now returned, I am. 

Sincerely yours, 
ELBERT A. BRINCKERHOFF. 



Association of the Bar, 
42 West 44th St., New York City. 

27th September, 1905. 
Inglis Stuart, Esquire: 

Dear Mr. Stuart — I thank you very much for giving me the op- 
portunity to read these pages in the life of Mr. Stuart, until which 
I had not been able to have in mind the general trend and experi- 
ences of one who has now passed from the constantly busy scenes 
from which Greater New York seems not likely to be soon separate. 
Lake George, Ticonderoga, Lockport, Middlebury, Bennington, the 



99 

War of 1812, General Andrew Jackson, the anti-slavery agitations, 
Ralph Waldo Emerson and his brother William, the Wall Street 
office, Richmond of Virginia, and the many intermediate worthies 
and places linked and perpetuated so evidently by traits of true 
Scottish descent, to a lifetime resident of the Empire State which 
once included Vermont, and furnish an indelible seal of "Composite 
Remembrance". 

It is not every time our privilege, such as you have given, to 
take up one by one the interesting and applicable component 
features. 

Very sincerely, 

ABRAHAM V. W. VAN VECHTEN. 



Washington, Nov. 23, 1908. 
Inglis Stuart, Esq., 
New York City. 

My Dear Inglis — I have to thank you for a copy of the new 
edition of "A Silver Gray's R. R. Reminiscences", which I have re- 
read with sincere pleasure. 

What a world of memories it recalls! Memories of the old 
days when your father and I were in close and frequent association 
and correspondence both as friends and professionally. 

I suppose it is natural for old men, looking backward to the 
"Golden Days" of their active associations and friendships, to have 
an assured and confident conviction that the men they knew and 
loved then were somehow better, finer, cleaner, more superb than 
those of a later generation. 

However this may be, I am quite sure that I am not influenced 
by any such prejudice when I recall Homer H. Stuart. He was 
enough older than I, perhaps, to have been my father, but I do not 
think of him as being so. To me he was always a wise friend 
with whom I talked and to whom I wrote as of my own generation. 

Of all the men in my catalogue of friends and associates (and 
you know my position in public life made me intimate with most 
of the leading men since and including Mr. Lincoln), Homer H. 
Stuart stands forth as peer of the best and greatest, in all the 
qualities that go to make the prince among men. His character 
and personality alone marked his high lineage more surely than all 
the Herald's Colleges on earth could have done. 

I knew him in times of stress and storm; under conditions 
and circumstances that would have developed in most men ugly 
qualities, but I can truly say that in every situation he was always 
the man and gentleman; master of himself, and thus master of 
others. I recall him with the greatest affection and reverence, and 
in our home his name is a household word for all that constitutes 
the model of manhood and attractiveness. His children cannot 
revere his memory more than do mine. 

Again thanking you for the pamphlet, as well as the portrait 
of your mother, believe me. 

Your sincere friend, 

JAMES H. SAVILLE. 



100 

NOTE— The letter which follows was written by one who had 
a prominent role in the annals of our political life. Through his 
clear-sightedness at a time when warring factions in the Republi- 
can party threatened its disruption it was saved by selecting Gen. 
James A. Garfield as its candidate for the Presidency. 

On the first ballot in that memorable convention at Chicago in 
1880 the chairman of the Pennsylvania delegation announced its 
fifty-eight votes almost equally divided between Grant and Blaine, 
and "one vote for James A. Garfield". That "one vote" came 
from the delegate sent by the Luzerne-Lackawanna Congressional 
District, William Alexander Montgomery Grier of Hazleton, Lu- 
zerne County. At intervals joined by another delegate, but usually 
entirely alone, during that protracted battle of the ballots Mr. 
Grier persistently adhered to his choice. At last he had the rare 
emotion of witnessing State delegation after State delegation rally- 
ing to Garfield! 

It was a wonderful instance of how the unfiinching steadfast- 
ness of one man prevailed, and finally ranged behind his standard 
the nearly eight hundred of those contending fellow delegates. 



76 St. JamiiS Place, 
Brooklyn, Jan. 14, 1908. 

Dear Mr. Stuart — I heartily thank you for the copy of "A Silver 
Gray's R. R. Reminiscences" just reed, and am pleased that altho' 
we have met only casually, and at infrequent intervals, for many 
years past, you did not forget me in the distribution. 

It is a unique and very interesting little brochure which I 
have enjoyed reading and shall carefully preserve. 

I was a commuter on the Long Island R. R., the scene of these 
reminiscences, for several years in the early '80's, and it was during 
that time that I became acquainted with your father, not on the 
aforesaid R. R., for it was two to three decades earlier that he 
traveled it, but in the old building 63 Wall St. where we both, 
and you also, had our offices. x\s in our day a number of "good 
fellows" journeyed to and fro on the same trains, very pleasant 
friendships and enjoyable times resulted, so I can easily imagine 
the similar pleasures enjoyed by those "old timers" of the "50's". 
The leisurely pace at which in those days Long Island Railroad 
trains ran, compensated commuters for their shorter business hours 
by giving them longer time for the cultivation of friendships. 

Your father and I exchanged salutations just a few moments 
before he passed so suddenly out of this life. And then, just a 
few moments later, I was gazing" on his silent form! Altho' nearly 
a quarter of a century has fiown since that sad afternoon in 
October, 1885, I retain the most vivid remembrance of his striking 
personality. He was indeed a handsome man, in the best sense 
of that word, not alone because of his symmetrical figure, the 
beautifully moulded lines of his face, the clear complexion, but be- 
cause a distinct impression was made of his kindness, benevolence. 



101 

geniality, sincerity and mental vigor. Your reverence for his mem- 
ory is charming. You can well felicitate yourself on such a 
parentage. 

Yours ve-ry sincerely, 

W. A. M. GRIER. 
^Inglis Stuart, Esq., 
New York. 



163 Willis Ave. W., 
Detroit, Mich., 

August 31, 1906. 

My Dear Inglis — It gave me very great happiness to receive a 
copy of the Genealogy of your family, and especially to read the 
biography of your father. I can never think of him without emo- 
tion. Such a grand, noble, dignified, yet kindly and benignant face 
and bearing! Power seemed to be the predominant characteristic. 
His head and shoulders were leonine, kingly. I was drawn toward 
him first by the attitude which he always assumed toward myself. 
I was but a youth when I first knew him, but he treated me as an 
equal and conversed with me as a companion on science, religion, 
philosophy and history until I was bewildered with his learning 
and his logic. He was most interesting in his conversations and 
I always loved to be with him. He has influenced my life and my 
thought. He paid me that most delicate of compliments, the put- 
ting of himself on my level and assuming that I was as learned 
as himself. In general society he took little pleasure. He loved 
rather to be in his home, his study, and with his books. He was 
a grand character. I remember well his interest in Natural History. 

Like all great characters, he was very simple in his tastes and 
modest in his demeanor. He valued the true rather than the 
false. I think he retired within himself and took his greatest hap- 
piness with his family, largely because he detested the shams and 
empty conventionalities of so-called Society. 

Personally I owe much to him. When he learned that I had de- 
cided to go to college, knowing that my father's circumstances 
would prevent him from helping me financially, your father, un- 
solicited, wrote me a confidential letter offering to lend me what- 
ever money I should require for the four years' course, to be re- 
paid in yearly instalments beginning three or four years after my 
graduation. I was greatly touched by this evidence of interest 
and affection and I availed myself of his kindness during the last 
two years of my college course. Several years later when I had re- 
paid a part of my indebtedness, he wrote me to keep the balance 
still due, and put it in the bank for the benefit of the education 
of my son, Homer Stuart Sayres. 

I could recall many other things, incidents and memories, but 
I have said enough to show you how much I loved your father. 
Indeed, one of my boys is named for him, and my one girl, Margaret 
Stuart Sayres, is named after your dear mother. 

Affectionately yours, 

WILLIAM S. SAYRES. 



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